Has Google changed the way it ranks websites?

There has been an email going around the last few days scaremongering that Google has radically changed it's natural listing ranking format by including 'Google Places Pages'.

Google Places Pages are what we have know for a long time as Google Business Listings.


They have been a useful long term SEO tactic for local businesses such as trades and B2B suppliers. Not many people had latched on to the fact that Google has, for a long time, shown listings and a small local map with markers when a geographic qualifier was included in the search term.

Like any SEO activity, the 'secret' to success to being shown in that map is relevance. A good description, keywords and choice of categories is more likely to bring a listing higher. Add to that a few reviews and the always important external inbound links to the website from influential sites, and you have a top listing when someone types in 'Plumber Gorleston' for example. The more refined the geographic term - the better chance you have of success.

So is this new?

No not really. All that's happened is that Google have decided to give it a little more relevance than they had done previously.

Any web designer worth his salt would have organised a Google Business Listing for you anyway and encouraged you to get your customers to login and leave a good review. Plus, of course, look for good directories and sites to gain links from. Inbound links are good for your website and your Business Listing too.

Google Places Pages are covered in my email Website Marketing Course which all my clients receive now, once their site is up and running.

So looking at this email, it's more about trying to sell you a link on their directories rather than 'new' news. But a useful reminder of it's importance all the same.
 
Need help setting up a Google Places Page, or Google Business Listing if you prefer it in old money, then just call or email me.

Be Careful With Your Web Content

One of my FaceBook friends re-posted this article today (you can click past the popup advert).
It's important that everyone with a website should read it and follow the results as they unfold.

Creating content for your website MUST be from you and your business, not pinched from someone else's site. That's an infringement of copyright. The Internet is NOT in a copyright free bubble and writers have as much ownership over their words (and images) as if they were in a printed publication.

That doesn't mean to say you can never use others text and articles.

There are plenty of resources where writers are happy for you to use their work provided that you credit them accordingly and include any web links that they ask for.

Try this one for example http://www.ezinearticles.com/
And for images http://www.istockphoto.com/
So there is no excuse.

The other side of this is that you must protect your own work online by ensuring that it clearly says the content of your web site or blog is your copyright. That way you have at least a fighting chance of protecting it.

Do you do cold calling?

The quality (or lack of it) of cold calls I seem to be receiving lately is upsetting.

Nobody really likes to receive cold calls I'm sure, so is it not vitally important to excel in that call to make sure you get the result you are looking to achieve?

I had yet another Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) company call me this afternoon.

Without introduction to who they were, they proudly told me that my website wasn't ranking a particular keyword phrase and presumably would have gone on to tell me that they could get it to number one in the Google list within a week.

They obviously hadn't done their homework as the phrase is one of the most competitive on the internet and I have only one sub-page deep in my website targeting it. So the chances of that being sustainably achievable in a short time scale without resorting illegal methods that could potentially get me removed from the index completely - are zero.

Not only that, but they had based their statement simply on the fact that I have, as a short term test at the moment, a Pay Per Click (PPC) Campaign running that targets the phrase.

They didn't ask me what my business goals and plans were and how that keyphrase fitted in with them, nor had they looked at my website to understand what I was really about.

You might get a good idea of how that call ended today. I should have offered to mentor their sales staff perhaps, but I didn't get their company name and when I called 1471 the number had been withheld, surprise, surprise!

I'm occasionally asked to run call campaigns on behalf of my clients, often targeting very high powered individuals within global industries who have an even shorter fuse than me! But I get through and get the job done because I take the time to research and find out what they are up to and what they really need.

Every business needs to do some cold calling at some point and if it's going to be successful it needs care and thought to get good results.

http://www.roygough.co.uk/

Don't make it difficult for your website visitors

Tolerance levels are low. Patience is short. Not accepting that in our prospects can ruin the chances of a sale.

This morning I found a great system to help people with their web marketing. Really impressed with it, I searched around the site to see if there was an affiliate program for me to recommend it onto my contacts and clients.


Then I encountered - 'The Form'


It was lengthy and had a fair splattering of agreements that I had to agree to, which I had expected when money is involved. But, each time I tried to complete the process, it threw up messages saying that something was missing.

OK, that's reasonably normal, but what I hadn't noticed was a message in small type at the top pointing out something else I'd missed in addition to the main error it had highlighted. Not only that, but each time I had to re-accept all the agreements by ticking a bunch of boxes again.

After five attempts to say I was getting exasperated would be an understatement and just about to ditch the whole thing. It's a good job it was a damn good product otherwise I would have been long gone! I do wonder how many potential affiliates they lose?

It strikes me that they hadn't asked someone outside of the business to fill in the form as a test. If they had, it surely would have come to light.

Do you have a form or your site? Have you really looked at the messages that appear if something goes wrong? What about the page that they get taken to once completed? Is it clear what will happen next? Is it clear that the process has been successful?

Website visitors COST MONEY to attract - don't throw that money away.

If you need help or advice on your website marketing contact me via my website here:

http://www.roygough.co.uk/

Some real website crackers!

I always love to see websites that make you scream in horror!

In these days of templates and easy to use web generators you can't really believe that stuff like this is still around.

Anyway enjoy these www's - (woeful web wonders)

http://msy.com.au/

http://www.frnz.de/

http://www.dokimos.org/ajff/

http://home.comcast.net/~computerphysicians/

http://www.arngren.net/

http://www.cwol.com/

Ohh, The bucket's over there in the corner by the way.

If you want to make sure your customers feel comfortable and happy when they visit your website contact me at Alloy CRM and I'll help you sort it out.

How did you choose your business name?

Choosing a business name always seems an exciting time and loads of ideas run around your head before you finally settle on 'The One'. But there's a few things that you should consider before those ideas run wild.

1. If the business is not going to be a global player, and potentially a household name, then including something that indicates something about what you do can help potential customers decide if they should be calling you or not.

Clever is ok, but if it leaves them mystified, it hasn't really helped the cause. Would Aviva, Corus or Square Giraffe say anything about your business?

If your business is really local I would even consider making it blatantly obvious what you do - Suffolk Management Training or Norfolk Plumbing Repairs.

2. Next on the list is to find out if your chosen name already exists. A search on Companies House and Trade Mark listings will show up whether your new business 'McDonalds Take Away' might get you into deep water with their legal department or simply get you confused with others of a similar name.

3. Finally you need to consider the Internet.

You really do need to have a domain name that matches your business name. Without that people will struggle to find you. If you have got this far and the domain name isn't available then I would go back to step one and start again.

If you are a UK based business then you absolutely need to have the .co.uk version of your business name but I would also buy the .com .net .tv .info and .biz versions too. Just think of the consequences of a competitor setting up in the same business, taking one of those domain suffixes, marketing it like mad and taking half your business. Just allow enough in your budget to buy all of them to be sure.

If we take one of the business name examples above I would also buy the hyphenated and non-hyphenated versions - suffolkmanagementtraining as well as suffolk-management-training. The second version is easier for people to see, understand and remember when it's on your physical advertising.

Hyphens can help too if the words could be mis-read when put together. There are some famous 'howlers' in this department which must have horrified their owners once they realised:-

therapistfinder - 'therapist finder' or could be 'the rapist finder'
expertsexchange - 'experts exchange' or 'expert sex change'
whorepresents - 'who represents' or 'whore presents'
penisland - which is actually 'pen island' apparently

Advertising the hyphenated version of each of those domain names would have saved a great deal of embarrassment!

If you are choosing your business name, then choose it wisely.

Needs some help getting your business up and running? Just call me. Sales & Marketing Strategy with AlloyCRM

Don't hide your success - shout about it!

We had a stroll around the beautiful grounds of Blickling Hall in Norfolk today. A really picturesque setting with a National Trust managed stately hall as it's setting - well worth a visit.

Next to the car park is a shop called Samphire that sells excellent local food including their renowned local sausages.

You can't miss that their sausages are good (and I can tell you that they are good!) because everywhere you look it says that Gary Rhodes says they are the best he's ever tasted! In fact it's quite difficult to walk out of the shop without buying some the message is so strong.

We British are pretty poor at being proud of what we do well. Make sure that, if someone tells you how good you are, you let everyone know - on your website, in your advertising, on your van, in a press release to the media.

Don't hide your success - shout about it!

Who's your ideal customer?

How often do you really sit down and think about who your ideal customer would be?

I did this excercise with a client recently. I started off by narrowing down the size of business, then the sector and finally came up with some suggested target customers.

But what really developed from this was the ability to write some compelling material for their website that would focus on the problems and issues that business (and ones like them) probably have.

Writing grabbing headlines and sub text that tunes into the day-to-day business problems they confront and then showing how you can solve them is a great way to get your prospective client excited about you and your services.

I often use the process outlined by Andy Bounds in his book, The Jelly Effect, to really get to the route of why customers might buy from you. Getting away from what you think they want to buy and understanding what they want to buy can make a big difference to the results of your marketing efforts.

Try it yourself and see what you come up with, then try the wording on your website. Measure the results in terms of conversion rates over a few days and draw your own conclusions.

If you need help - just ask!

What are your buyers buying?

I spent some time last week with a small start up that manufactures very small run art decor occasional furniture.

They wanted me to help them setup and layout their web site based on Actinic, the popular off the shelf web shop application.

The key concept I had to get across was that their customers are not buying 'a nest of tables'.

They are buying something that makes them feel good. An attractive place to put down their wine glass at the end of a long day and relax - a table that you pull out when you have friends round and they are so taken with it they want to know where you found it.

It's the good feelings you have inside that your buyers want when they are looking for this sort of purchase.

Is that the sort of product you sell? Think about how they might feel when they have bought it and make that the centre of your sales message and it's supporting images.

Is the 'Home' page of your website of any value?

Is the 'Home' page of your website of any value?

The way in which all the main search engines, such as Google, work is that they find your home page, follow it's navigation links and discover all the other pages that make up the site.

If you've been doing your Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) correctly, each of those pages will be targeting a tightly focused small number of keywords or phrases. The purpose is to help Google understand EXACTLY what that page is about so that it can effectively determine when to show that page in the organic , or natural, listing as a good potential page for the searcher to view.

This shows that Google indexes pages rather than sites as a whole. Your Home page probably isn't sufficiently keyword focused to be shown in most listings as a response to a search query. This leads to some SEO experts to say that the Home page is of little value.

I beg to differ.

1. Unless you are a totally internet based business relying upon the search engine rankings to gain site visitors you will be using your domain name - www.mycompanyname.co.uk, which is effectively your Home page - on your business card, flyers, brochures, newspaper adverts, on your van and anywhere else you can legally find to display it.

2. If someone hears about your business they might just type in your company name. That could well produce your home page at the top of the search engine listings because it probably isn't product or service targeted.


So your Home page is absolutely vital. It's your office reception. Most bricks and mortar businesses spend a great deal on making their reception area feel warm, inviting and confidence building so that you might feel happier doing business with them.


Make sure your Home page creates a great impression and easily directs visitors to the part of the site they are looking for.

But in reality, every page on your site is a 'reception'. If that's the first page they go to on your site then it's really got to do the same job as the Home page, but do it's sales job as well. That's going to be tough to get right.

Is it any wonder that making profit from your website can be so tough?

If you need help with your site to make it profitable my Wesite Profit Program might be your answer.

Local Business Website Profit Success

Norwich based, up-market gents hairdressers Truman's wanted a web site that would do justice to their quality men's grooming services and desirable Elm Hill location. Within days the website, created by Alloy CRM, was ranking at the top of the search engine listing for their keywords and phrases.

Just as icing on the cake, after just a few days, Truman's received a call from a lady in Felixtowe who had found them in the search listings. She went on to book a top of the range grooming day for the special man in her life - business, and valuable revenue, that could not have come about just a few weeks earlier.

You can see Truman's site here: http://www.trumansofnorwich.co.uk

Alloy CRM can create websites with excellent Search Engine Optimisation ( SEO )and generate profit for Small businesses at sensible prices.

Websites with a commercial focus

There is more to a website than making it look pretty.

The whole purpose of a commercial website is to increase sales, revenue and therefore profit.

Without having that as your foundation what is the point of spending a great deal of money to achieve nothing?

I sat with a small local organisation recently. They are not, and don't need to be, commercially focused. Or at least they didn't think they were.

Just because they're not my traditional target market didn't mean that I would skip my interrogation of their financial position and reasoning behind the decision to have a good web presence.

Digging around I discovered that they are a charity and require money to maintain their building. They have spare capacity for hire and filling their venue would go a long way to alleviating their financial needs.

So yes, the right web presence could have the desired effect and, if done properly, could attract hirers who are prepared to pay more than they are currently charging.

But there's more...

Using my commercially creative side I have suggested a way in which the website could generate its own recurring revenue without a great deal of effort. I won't go into details here as it's still in its embryonic stage at the moment. But suffice to say that the business model is sound and could transform their facility for everyone in their community.

You don't have to be in a commercial environment to use commercial logic. But doing so can resolve a surprising number of non commercial issues and problems.

Need help with your website profits ? Alloy CRM

Tips for using video to gain customers

It's reasonably well accepted that having a video on your site can be good for buyer confidence, good for sales and if hosted correctly, good for SEO too.

But there's some things you must do to ensure that you get maximum benefit.

Let's start with the video its self:

Don't make it too long
Boredom thresholds are low. Our exposure to modern day 'bite sized' TV programming and short, snappy adverts that are mini stories in their own right means we are intolerant of anything that labours a point. A front page video snippet shouldn't be more than a minute or so long. If longer is required, create a short 'taster' for the front page and a link to the full version further into the site.

Make it have a purpose
Just like the headlines and content of your site, your video should be focused on drawing in your visitor by providing useful and interesting content. If it's to gain your visitors confidence then tell them how you've successfully helped others for example.

Make it interesting, amazing or funny
A difficult one this as it won't always come off. But if you can do it you have the chance of it going viral - a link to your video forwarded on to loads of other people with the obvious business benefits that it would bring.

Where you host you video is important too:

Hosting on your servers
Not always the best option. However, if you have long videos or you want better quality it might be the right way to go.

Hosting on Video Sites
External hosting avoids the possibility of racking up bandwidth charges if its popular. The biggest bonus is that your video might be seen by more people and gain you extra business. There's a load to choose from with YouTube the most popular and well known. Google videos no longer accepts new uploads presumably because of their YouTube purchase.

How you setup the video on the hosting is really important as the whole point of the exercise is to attract visitors to your site:

Choosing a user name
Just like themeing for your website, the user name you choose ought to be keyword based to help with SEO

Setting up the description
You always have the option to write a short description which will show up next to your video (or at least the first few lines) Kick this off with your web address. Start it with http:// and it will automatically be a clickable hyperlink, so if they like what they see, you are only a click away.

Also include, in the description, your keywords and phrases that match your target. Include them in the tags too. That will help push your video up the listings when someone does an appropriate search.

Start a Channel
This is a customisable area to showcase your videos with its own description and profile that can include all your SEO friendly keywords. The channel also shows your favorite videos and those people who are following you. So just like any other Social Media exercise you should find ways to increase your following.

If you need help with getting effective video onto your website contact me at Alloy CRM.

Get to the point on your website

Get to the point!

Your potential customers, generally, don't want to mess about.


When they arrive on your website they are probably looking for either of two things:

1. If they know of your business by recommendation they are just looking for how to contact you - email or phone.

2. If they arrived by searching or a tenuous link verbally or otherwise, it's information they're looking for.


They haven't the time or the patience to rummage around to find stuff. You need to get straight to the point.

Make sure your contact phone number and email address are prominent 'above the fold' that is the section of your web page that can be seen without scrolling down.

Make it bold and, if your purpose is to solicit phone calls from enquirers put it at the top right of the screen. This tends to be the spot that takes the eye.

If they are after information - then give it to them!

They're probably not particularly interested at this moment that you have been in business for 30 years, or that you have the best staff team around. All they want to know is, do you sell the type of things they are looking for, what variations/options are available and how will these solve my problem or fulfil my desire.

If you've made them click a couple of times to get that information, they've probably already gone back to the search engines to find an alternative. Harsh, but true.


If you get past that, then they want to know why they should choose you and how they can be confident that you are the right supplier. Why would they want to know that first before knowing even if you are a potential supplier?

Analyse your website home page, or at least the first page they are likely to see, through your customers eyes and ask yourself if it fits the bill.

If you need help to make your website work then look at our Website Profit Program from Alloy CRM

What's your page rank and what is it's influence?

The search engine Google works hard to identify the websites that it believes would be the best option to show at the top of the listing when we type something into their search box.

Google takes loads of different factors into consideration to determine that all important list. Bottom line is that Google wants to keep us using their search engine above all others and rightly believes that, if it offers the best and most useful sites for us to visit, we'll keep coming back.

As a guide to how important Google thinks a site is, they have a Page Rank system. Ranging from 1 to 10, with 10 being the top, each indexed web page - note I said page, not site, is allocated a ranking number.

You can see the Page Rank for any site quite easily. First you need to install the Google toolbar for your web browser here: http://pack.google.com/intl/en-gb/pack_installer.html?hl=en-gb
By default the Page Rank (PR) tool probably won't be on there, but you can add it in easily by right clicking on your newly installed Google Toolbar.

With that done every web page you visit will show the Page Rank. You will find that lots of pages have a PR of less than 2, maybe even 0, which means that they are unlikely to show up in Googles search listing other than for very unique phrases such as your own business name if it's unusual enough.

At the other end of the scale are sites like bbc.co.uk which has a PR of 9 - even they can't make 10! The difference between each rank increases enormously as you go up the scale. So you might be able to move from 2 to 3 reasonably easily, but the move from 6 to 7 is enormous.

So how can you influence your own PR and stand a better chance of ranking better?

Three key factors really:
1: Make sure that Google understands what your site is about by the careful selection and use of keywords throughout your content.
2. Relevant content, more relevant content and even more relevant content! The more there is on your site the more Google will absorb and value your site accordingly.
3. Links into your site from other sites. The higher the PR of those linking sites the better. So if you could get a link to you from bbc.co.uk that would benefit you tremendously.

I've been fairly simplistic about how the PR system works and can be influenced. There are a whole host of factors to be taken into consideration and I may well delve into those a little deeper in another post.

If you want to improve your standing in the PR stakes give me a call or click here to improve your website profit

Alloy CRM helps businesses to increase sale, revenue and profit

Get your business to the top of the Google rankings - For Free?

No this isn't some scam - It's simply using Google's own Google Maps based free business listing.

This facility allows you to set up your own business listing with a web address, real address and contact phone. You also have the ability to write a description of your business with opening times and a number of other bits and pieces.

If you set up your listing the same way as you would the SEO of your web site, that is with keywords and phrases in the description, you have a good chance of your listing being shown when a web searcher includes a geographical reference. For example, 'plumber in norwich' (go and do that search now) brings up a Google maps list of plumbers who have taken the trouble to create their own listing.

Just like any SEO work you may have to be a bit smart with the keywords and phrases you use, especially if it's a competitive sector, but it's worth a try for free surely?

If you need help maximising your Google listing drop me a mail or visit my website.
Need help to make your website produce profit?
http://www.alloycrm.com/websiteprofit

How are you selling?

Sorry to keep harping back to this again but I just think it's so important - especially in the current climate.

I guess that in your business you will have, or do, one of these things:
1. Have a retail shop
2. Have a trade counter and display
3. Have a demonstration area or showroom
4. Have an exhibition stand for trade shows
5. Have a presentation you use either one to one or at events
6. Used a designer to create your ads and leaflets

If you are serious about growing and increasing profit through sales you will have spent a great deal of time and care making sure that these are right.

By that I mean you would take care to make sure that your products and services are presented in a way that fits the environment and client you are targeting.

If you were looking to buy a Bentley you would expect the showroom to have a certain ambiance and appear upmarket. Buying produce from a farmers market you expect it to look fresh and presented well but may feel cheated if it was all laid in cardboard boxes that seemed to come from a wholesaler rather than directly from the fields. Would you man your exhibition stand in jeans and tee shirt if you were hoping to sell to business leaders?

We are all influenced significantly not just by the product but also it's presentation. That presentation needs to reflect, and tap into, the likely reason for buying.

It is said that there are 3 reasons people buy:
Greed
Fear
Desire

I have yet to see ad ad for a Bentley parked outside a roadside layby cafe surrounded by white vans and lorries. It's more likely to be on a beautiful country road, outside a stately home or the Savoy hotel, building a desire to be part of that lifestyle.

Where am I going with this?

Fire up your web browser and look at your own website.

Does it have the right ambiance? Does it look how a buyer would expect it to look?

Help your customers understand what they will gain, save or avoid by using your product and you will have a better chance of getting the result you want from your website.

Maybe you need to look at your other advertising, not just your website, in the same way too?

If you need help with sales have a look at our Sales Accelerator
If you need help with your wesite take a look at our Website Profit Program

What make a website a popular website?

With billions of websites out there all trying to attract your attention, it might be interesting to look at a few really successful sites to understand what might make them so popular.

Now these are just my views on these sites and there are probably a whole load of other factors too, but here goes.

bbc.co.uk
Enormous breadth and depth of information/content

youtube.com
Is this one of the greatest entertaining/time wasting sites ever?

gocompare.com
Saving money is on many peoples agenda normally. It's probably on everyones agenda in the current economic crisis

facebook.com
Another great time waster but the interaction factor just makes it so absorbing

'Adult' Sites
Exciting and teasing (so I'm told)


Now lets summarise that -

Informative
Entertaining
Money Saving
Interactive
Exciting

Do you think it would be worth making your website good enough to be described in one, or a few, of those terms? I bet if you did, it would be far more successful and earn you a lot more money than it is now.

Try it.

Alloy CRM has a Website Profit Program designed for small businesses that will increase profit.

Internet sales preditions for 2009 UP!

A report in eMarketer confidently predicts an increase in internet sales of about 4% in the US. Now that's not much but against high street drops of up to 10% it seems like good news to me.

Additionally a survey by ATG also in the US at the back end of last year, in the midst of the downturn, showed that purchasers would be turning to the internet to both research their requirements and actually buy where appropriate more than ever before. One of the triggers, along with price, for a purchase was no cost delivery.

So what should we take from this?

Well, there is no doubt now that EVERY business should be represented on the internet. But more than that, it needs to show your business in a professional and trustworthy way otherwise those potential customers will just head straight back to the search listings to find someone else. We know they are spending, and making purchasing decisions, via the internet - you need to make sure your are getting your fair share of those sales.

If you need help to make your website work and produce profit, I offer a Website Profit Program designed to help and guide you.

Alloy CRM is a Sales & Marketing Strategy consultancy that helps businesses find new ways of increasing Sales, Revenue and Profit.

New Year - New Revenue?

New Year - New Revenue? What can you do differently in 2009 that could significantly improve your revenue and profit?

Here's just a few ideas:

• Look back through your customer list and see who hasn't bought from you in the last 12 months. Contact them, find out why and rebuild the relationship if they are still potential customers.
  
• Check back to see who you pitched for business but lost out. Try re-packaging your offer in a different way and contact them.
  
• Build a follow up program for everyone who buys from you. Use that to maintain contact, make your customer realise you care and probably gain some referrals and testimonials into the bargain.
  
• Don't just carry on with the same old advertising. Be bold and look for something different. Try different publications, divert some of your spend to internet marketing and review your website to make sure it isn't losing you potential customers.
  
• Be more targeted about looking for new customers. Look at your customer base and see which industry sector and size profile produces the best results for you, find out where those sort of businesses hang out and join in with them.
  
• Try networking. There are plenty of events around each with it's own style and visitor profile. It might feel scary the first time but it's worth the effort. Networkers love to help each other and you could well create some useful contacts.

All the best to you for 2009 - may it be your most profitable yet.