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Content Marketing Success: 8 Proven Strategies for Small Businesses

Wed, 26 Mar 2025 10:13:38 GMT

In today's digital landscape, effective content marketing can be the key differentiator for small businesses striving to stand out. As consumers increasingly turn to online platforms for information, brands must engage their audiences through valuable content that resonates with their needs.

Understanding the nuances of content marketing is crucial; it encompasses various strategies designed to attract, inform, and delight customers while ultimately driving sales. From developing engaging customer personas to measuring success through specific metrics, small businesses have an incredible opportunity to refine their marketing approach.

This article explores eight proven strategies that can lead to content marketing success for small businesses, equipping you with the tools necessary to create impactful and sustainable marketing efforts.

1. Understanding the Importance of Content Marketing

Content marketing is vital for small businesses. It helps connect them with their target audience, builds brand awareness, and drives organic traffic. A well thought out content marketing strategy lets small businesses compete with larger companies by using cost effective methods.

Regularly sharing valuable content can position a business as an expert in its field. This fosters trust and encourages potential customers to seek their services. Documenting your content strategy also increases the chances of seeing your marketing efforts as effective, allowing a higher allocation of budget toward content marketing.

Creating a diverse range of content types is key. Here are some content formats to consider:

Blog Posts
Social Media Posts
Email Marketing
Visual Content

Developing a strategic content plan helps business owners carve out unique market spaces. Establishing clear business goals and using tools like Google Analytics to gauge conversion rates can refine your approach.

Below is a quick checklist for effective content marketing:

Know your target audience

Set SMART goals
Use a content calendar
Perform a content audit

By focusing on these elements, small businesses can enhance their content marketing efforts and achieve growth.

2. Developing Customer Personas for Targeted Engagement

To create targeted content, small business owners should develop detailed buyer personas. These personas are fictional versions of ideal customers, including demographic and psychographic details. Tools like Google Analytics and social media insights provide valuable data to shape these personas, making them more accurate.

Understanding your target audience through buyer personas is key. It allows content marketers to tailor pieces of content that address specific needs and challenges. This approach boosts engagement and builds trust with potential customers.

It is often necessary to have multiple personas to cater to various products, services, or customer segments. Each persona reflects different motivations and interactions with your brand at various stages of the customer journey.

Here's how you can develop them:

Collect Data: Use surveys, Google Analytics, and social media insights.
Analyse: Determine the needs, interests, and behaviours of your audience.
Create Multiple Personas: Define different segments based on your findings.
Tailor Content: Use the personas to guide your content marketing efforts.

Effective personas lead to a successful content marketing strategy, enhancing your business goals with every piece of content created.

3. Crafting a Comprehensive Content Plan

Creating a successful content plan is key for small business owners. It acts as a guide to align all your content marketing efforts with your business goals.

Here’s how you can craft a comprehensive content plan:

Identify Key Topic Areas: Focus on subjects relevant to your target audience. This ensures you create valuable content that speaks directly to potential customers.
Choose Content Types: Use a mix of blog posts, infographics, and videos. Different content formats can help engage various segments of your market.
Plan Distribution Channels: Decide where to share your content. Consider social media posts, email marketing, and your website for maximum reach.
Set Calls to Action: Encourage your audience to take the next step. This could be signing up for a newsletter or visiting a product page.
Utilise a Content Calendar: This keeps your content marketing strategy organised and consistent, minimising missed opportunities.
Analyse Metrics: Use Google Analytics to track conversion rates, engagement, and content performance.

Including these elements in your content plan aligns with the fact that structured strategies significantly boost success rates. Regular content audits refine this strategy further, ensuring continued engagement and growth .

4. Harnessing the Power of SEO and Local SEO

Harnessing the power of SEO and local SEO is vital for small businesses. SEO is a long term strategy. It may take months to see real changes in search rankings. This is why patience and consistency are key.

A study by Ahrefs shows that the average page ranking in Google's top 10 is over two years old. This underscores the importance of a long term commitment to SEO practices. For small businesses serving specific areas, local SEO is crucial.

To optimise local SEO, focus on:

Claiming and optimising your Google My Business listing.
Ensuring consistent NAP (Name, Address, Phone Number) information.
Encouraging customer reviews.

These steps can enhance your online presence and attract nearby customers. According to a report by Semrush, 46% of all Google searches are local. This creates a significant opportunity for small businesses.

Here's a quick guide for local SEO essentials:

Local SEO Tips

Google My Business - Claim and optimise your listing
Consistent NAP - Ensure Name, Address, and Phone number are uniform
Customer Reviews - Encourage and respond to them

By focusing on these strategies, you can effectively harness the power of SEO and local SEO to grow your business.

5. Utilising Social Media for Extended Reach

Developing a social media strategy is crucial for expanding your brand's reach. Focus on the unique expectations of each platform. This is because user demographics and content preferences vary widely.

First, conduct market research. Identify where your target audience spends time. This helps tailor content and boosts engagement.

Consider repurposing content into different formats. Each platform prefers specific types of content. For instance, short videos work well on Instagram and TikTok, while detailed articles perform better on LinkedIn.

Here’s a quick guide to using social media effectively:

Identify Target Platforms : Use analytics tools to see where your audience is most active.
Repurpose Content: Turn a blog post into an infographic or a series of social media posts.
Optimise Profiles: Ensure profiles are complete and visually appealing.
Engage Consistently: Respond promptly to comments and messages.

A strong social media presence, with optimised profiles and engaging content, will heighten brand discovery. This strategy helps your brand appear more in the feeds of potential customers.

6. Creating a Consistent Content Calendar

A content calendar is a crucial tool for small business owners to streamline their content marketing strategy. It outlines what content will be published, when, and on which platforms. This consistency helps in maintaining focus and ensures no opportunities are missed.

Diversifying content types, such as blog posts, infographics, videos, and social media updates, within your calendar helps engage your audience. By targeting different market segments, you ensure that your message reaches potential customers effectively.

Establishing a monthly or quarterly plan allows businesses to allocate resources like time, budget, and manpower towards activities with the best return on investment. It’s a roadmap showing how each piece of content contributes to business goals.

Regularly reviewing your content performance can reveal what works for your audience. This allows for timely adjustments and makes your content marketing efforts more effective. Keep an eye on conversion rates and use tools like Google Analytics to track key performance indicators.

Here’s a simple format to get started:

Content Type - Blog Post
Platform - Website
Publish Date - 10-Nov-2023
Objective - Engage

A well-structured content calendar leads to a successful content marketing strategy.

7. Measuring Success: Key Metrics to Monitor

To gauge the success of your content marketing plan, it's crucial to establish clear metrics. These metrics should align with your business goals, whether it's enhancing brand awareness or boosting lead generation. Key performance indicators (KPIs) might include engagement rates, such as likes, shares, and comments, along with traffic data like visitor numbers and conversion rates.

Here’s a quick checklist of tools and metrics to monitor:

Tools:
Google Analytics
HubSpot Analytics
Metrics:
Engagement: likes, shares, comments
Traffic: visitor numbers, new vs. returning visitors
Conversion rates
Dwell time
Bounce rate

Tools like Google Analytics can provide valuable insights by tracking content performance across different channels. Regularly analyse metrics like new vs. returning visitors and dwell time to assess audience engagement. Keep an eye on bounce rates to refine your strategy.

Regular review and adaptation of your content strategy based on these metrics are essential. This will help optimise your efforts and achieve desired outcomes in your content marketing strategy. Adjusting your approach based on real time data ensures the creation of valuable content that truly resonates with your target audience.

8. Adapting Strategies for Continuous Improvement

Adapting your content marketing strategies is key to staying relevant and effective. Keeping an eye on current events and trending topics can significantly boost your content's relevance. When your content resonates with your target audience, it helps engage potential customers. Tracking key performance indicators (KPIs) and listening to audience feedback play crucial roles. These insights allow your content calendar to evolve and align with your business goals.

Consistency is vital for small business owners. A well planned content calendar drives audience engagement and growth. But don't forget about SEO. By integrating SEO into your content marketing efforts, you can improve your visibility in search engine results pages (SERPs). This increases your reach without needing a large advertising budget.

A successful content marketing strategy involves the continuous creation of valuable content. Use metrics from tools like Google Analytics to fine tune your approach. Always be ready to adapt and improve.

Checklist for Continuous Improvement:

Monitor industry trends.
Use audience feedback.
Adapt content calendar.
Track KPIs.
Invest in SEO.

Adapting strategies ensures that your business remains competitive and responsive to change.

2025 Content Marketing: Tips, Statistics, and Strategies for Success

richard@innuo.co.uk (Richard Jaques) — Thu, 13 Mar 2025 11:16:37 GMT

As we look towards 2025, the landscape of content marketing is set to evolve dramatically. In a world where digital marketing reigns supreme, understanding the nuances of content marketing becomes crucial for brands aiming to thrive. This article will delve into the strategies, statistics, and tips that will define successful content marketing efforts in the coming years, offering insights that content marketers can leverage to enhance their marketing campaigns.

Understanding Content Marketing in 2025

What is Content Marketing?

Content marketing is a strategic approach focused on creating and distributing valuable content to engage a clearly defined audience. In 2025, this method will encompass various types of content, including blog posts, videos, podcasts, and infographics, each tailored to meet the needs of target audiences. By providing high quality content, brands can educate potential customers while building trust and establishing themselves as authorities in their industries. This approach is essential as customer relationships evolve and become increasingly paramount in driving profitable customer action.

The Evolution of Content Marketing

Content marketing has undergone a significant transformation over the years, moving from simple blog content to a multifaceted strategy that integrates various content types and channels. Initially serving as a tool for brand awareness, it now plays a vital role in the customer journey, influencing decision making at every stage. With the rise of digital platforms, content marketing strategies have become more data driven, focusing on measurable outcomes through SEO, social media marketing, and email marketing. As consumer behaviour continues to evolve, content marketers must adapt by incorporating interactive and personalised elements that enhance audience engagement and foster deeper connections.

Key Trends for 2025

In 2025, several key trends are expected to shape content marketing. The integration of artificial intelligence (AI) in content creation and optimisation will allow marketers to produce personalised content at scale, enhancing the effectiveness of marketing efforts. Video content is likely to dominate, with brands utilising social media platforms like TikTok and YouTube for storytelling and engagement. Furthermore, the emphasis on user generated content will grow, as brands strive to build community and authenticity. Privacy concerns will also drive changes in data collection and usage, prompting marketers to prioritise trust and transparency in their content marketing strategies.

Content Marketing Statistics You Need to Know

Current Metrics and Benchmarks

As of 2024, content marketing has firmly established itself as a cornerstone of both B2B and B2C strategies, with approximately 73% of B2B marketers and 70% of B2C marketers integrating it into their overall marketing efforts. The financial commitment to content marketing varies significantly; around 39% of companies allocate between £1,000 and £5,000 monthly, while 33% exceed this threshold. This trend reflects a growing recognition of the value of content marketing, as evidenced by the 69% of companies that increased their budgets in 2023. Additionally, a striking 62% of B2B buyers engage with 3 to 7 pieces of content before interacting with a salesperson, highlighting the critical role that high-quality content plays in the buyer's journey.

Impact of Content Marketing on ROI

The impact of content marketing on return on investment (ROI) cannot be overstated; it has been proven to reduce customer acquisition costs while simultaneously enhancing lead quality. Brands that prioritise content marketing often observe a snowball effect in their marketing success, where the returns from each piece of content published accumulate over time. This phenomenon is particularly pronounced in organisations that focus on creating evergreen content, which consistently attracts leads long after its initial release. Moreover, effective content marketing strategies can significantly boost conversion rates by nurturing leads throughout the sales funnel with valuable information tailored to their specific needs.

Industry Specific Statistics

Content marketing yields diverse benefits across various industries, showcasing its adaptability and effectiveness. For instance, in the technology sector, companies that prioritise content marketing can expect up to 60% more leads compared to those that neglect this approach. In healthcare, the impact of educational content is profound, often leading to a staggering 300% increase in website traffic. Furthermore, businesses leveraging video content report a remarkable 49% faster revenue growth than their counterparts that do not utilise such media. These statistics underscore the necessity for tailored content strategies that resonate with target audiences across different sectors, ultimately driving business success.

Tips for Creating Content in 2025

Understanding Your Audience

To create effective content marketing strategies in 2025, understanding your audience is paramount. This begins with conducting thorough research on demographics, interests, and pain points, enabling content marketers to craft valuable content that resonates. Developing ideal customer profiles can pinpoint the types of content that engage different market segments. Engaging directly with customers through surveys, social media interactions, and community involvement offers critical insights into their preferences. This direct feedback loop ensures the content created is not only relevant but impactful, ultimately enhancing the overall marketing efforts.

Utilising SEO Best Practices

SEO remains an essential component of successful content marketing in 2025. To optimise their content effectively, marketers should prioritise comprehensive keyword research that addresses the queries and interests of their target audience. Incorporating these relevant keywords naturally throughout the content, alongside optimising meta tags, headings, and image alt texts, can significantly enhance visibility in search engines. Furthermore, cultivating quality backlinks and ensuring a mobile friendly design will bolster search rankings. Regularly updating existing content is crucial to maintaining relevance and authority, ensuring that content marketing efforts yield the best possible outcomes.

Leveraging Multimedia Content

Incorporating various multimedia types into content marketing strategies can dramatically improve audience engagement. Video content, infographics, podcasts, and interactive elements such as quizzes or polls cater to diverse audience preferences and learning styles. For example, video content excels in storytelling, fostering higher retention rates, while infographics effectively distil complex data into visually appealing formats. By diversifying the types of content produced, brands can broaden their reach and keep their content fresh and engaging. This approach ultimately drives higher levels of interaction and conversion, key indicators of successful content marketing campaigns.

Content Marketing Examples and Case Studies

Successful B2B Content Marketing Campaigns

Successful B2B content marketing campaigns often focus on delivering valuable insights and educational resources. For instance, HubSpot has established itself as a thought leader in inbound marketing through comprehensive guides, driving significant web traffic and lead generation. Similarly, Salesforce's "Trailhead" platform offers interactive tutorials that not only educate users but also enhance their engagement with the brand. These examples of content marketing illustrate how providing high quality content can lead to increased brand loyalty and customer acquisition, making them exemplary case studies in effective B2B content marketing efforts.

Innovative Digital Marketing Strategies

Innovative digital marketing strategies in 2025 leverage the latest technologies and trends to engage audiences effectively. Brands like Blendtec have creatively utilised quirky content, such as their "Will It Blend?" series, to generate viral marketing campaigns that showcase their products in a humorous light. Additionally, companies like Adobe have invested in developing dedicated content hubs that offer valuable resources and insights, positioning themselves as industry leaders. These strategies underscore the importance of creativity and adaptability in content marketing, demonstrating how brands can thrive in an ever evolving digital landscape.

Lessons Learned from Top Brands

Top brands provide invaluable lessons in achieving content marketing success. Consistency in content creation is vital; brands that regularly publish high quality content see enhanced engagement and loyalty from their audiences. Moreover, understanding the customer journey and tailoring content to meet the needs of potential buyers at each stage can significantly boost conversion rates. Brands that actively engage with their audience via social media and respond to feedback foster stronger relationships and trust, essential for long term marketing success. These insights are crucial for any brand looking to refine its content marketing strategies.

The Role of Content Marketing in B2B

Benefits of Content Marketing for B2B Companies

Content marketing offers numerous benefits for B2B companies, including enhanced brand awareness, improved lead generation, and the establishment of thought leadership. By providing valuable and relevant content, B2B brands can attract potential customers and nurture them through the sales funnel effectively. Furthermore, content marketing helps in building trust and credibility, which are crucial in B2B transactions. Companies that leverage content marketing effectively often experience lower customer acquisition costs and higher customer retention rates, leading to sustained business growth and overall marketing success.

Forms of B2B Content Marketing

B2B content marketing can take various forms, including white papers, case studies, webinars, and email newsletters. White papers provide in depth analyses on industry trends or challenges, positioning the brand as an authority in its field. Case studies showcase real life success stories, helping to build trust with potential clients and illustrating the effectiveness of products or services. Webinars offer interactive learning experiences, allowing brands to engage directly with their audience. Email newsletters keep subscribers informed and nurtured, making them more likely to convert when the time is right for making a purchase decision.

How Content Marketing Can Help B2B Growth

Content marketing can significantly contribute to B2B growth by enhancing brand visibility and generating qualified leads. By consistently producing high quality content that addresses the specific needs and pain points of their target audience, companies can attract potential customers and guide them through the buyer's journey seamlessly. Additionally, content marketing fosters relationships and trust, which are essential for closing deals in the B2B space. As businesses increasingly rely on digital channels for engagement, a robust content marketing strategy becomes vital for sustained growth and gaining a competitive advantage in the marketplace.

Measuring the Success of Your Content Marketing

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

To effectively measure the success of content marketing efforts, it is essential to establish clear Key Performance Indicators (KPIs). Common KPIs include website traffic, engagement metrics (such as shares, comments, and likes), lead generation rates, and conversion rates. Tracking these metrics allows marketers to assess the effectiveness of their content and make data driven decisions. Additionally, understanding the customer journey and mapping KPIs to specific stages can provide deeper insights into how content influences buyer behaviour, ultimately enhancing the overall effectiveness of the marketing campaign.

Tools for Measuring Content Marketing Success

Several tools can assist marketers in measuring content marketing success. Google Analytics is a widely used platform that provides insights into website traffic and user behaviour, helping to fine tune strategies. Other tools, such as SEMrush and Ahrefs, offer valuable data on SEO performance and keyword rankings, which are crucial for optimising digital marketing efforts. Social media analytics tools can help track engagement and reach on various platforms, while marketing automation platforms provide metrics on email campaigns, allowing for a comprehensive view of content performance across channels and ensuring alignment with business objectives.

Adjusting Strategies Based on Metrics

Adjusting content marketing strategies based on performance metrics is crucial for long term success. Regularly reviewing KPIs and data insights enables marketers to identify what is working and what needs improvement. For instance, if certain content types are driving more engagement or conversions, it may be beneficial to focus on those formats in future campaigns. Similarly, if specific topics resonate more with the audience, creating additional content around those themes can enhance overall effectiveness. Adapting strategies based on metrics ensures that content marketing efforts remain aligned with business goals and audience needs, maximising marketing success.

Advanced keyword research: Going beyond the basics

Tue, 11 Mar 2025 09:38:00 GMT

Today, SEO is about far more than stuffing your website with keywords. Google and the other search engines are wise to this tactic and have moved on from it. So you need to move on too!

Basic keyword research can help you identify relevant terms for your business and audience, but relying just on high-traffic keywords will mean you are facing tough competition. For your website to rank highly on search engines, you need to be going beyond the basics and working on advanced keyword research.

Advanced keyword research will help you to spot gaps in the market, identify hidden opportunities from low-competition keywords, target specific audience segments, optimise your content and stay ahead of the competition.

Competitor analysis

The competition is a good place to start. But you need to do more than just copy them. The aim is to outperform them.

What do they do well? Where are they doing better than you? And where are they not doing as well? What have they missed, which you can take advantage of?

If your competitors are relying too heavily on high-competition keywords or a narrow market, you can use your research to fill the gaps and reach the audience they are missing out on.

And don’t just look at your direct competition. What about businesses working in a similar area to you? They might not be selling the same products or services, but if they are meeting a similar customer need, they might have some useful relevant keywords which your main competitors have neglected. You can use these in your own content!

Long-tail keywords

While many businesses rely on high-traffic short-tail keywords of one or two words, long-tail keyword can prove far more effective. These are made of four, five, six or more words and target exactly what users are looking for.

While long-tail keywords won’t drive as much traffic as their short-tail equivalent, they tend to convert at a higher rate. That’s because people searching for something using long-tail keywords have a better idea of exactly what they’re looking for. If you use these keywords, you reduce the competition and increase the chances of a sale.

If you’re not sure what long-tail keywords you should be using, try identifying the common questions related to your products, services or industry and incorporate them into your content. These questions can be turned into long-tail keywords eg ‘best trainers for a fast 5k’ or ‘best trainers for a beginner runner’. If you’re not sure what questions people are asking, use forums like Reddit and Quora for inspiration.

If your business operates in a specific geographical area, make sure you also include local long-tail keywords to attract local customers – this could be anything from a county or region right through to a suburb or local village.

Related keywords

If you’re too specific with your keywords, you could miss out on potential customers searching for what you offer using slightly different words. So it’s important to remember related keywords!

We’ve already touched on finding out what partial competitors – businesses working in a related but not identical area – are using. There are online tools, like SE Ranking’s SEO Competitor Checker and SEMrush, which can provide you with insights on a competitor or partial competitor, like the keywords they use to generate both organic and paid search traffic. Would any of those keywords help you reach new potential opportunities?

Use these keywords as a starting point to generate a list of related keywords. You can either brainstorm this with your team or put the new keywords into a tool like Google Keyword Planner, SEMrush or SE Ranking’s Keyword Search Tool.

Once you’ve got a list of related keywords, weave them into existing content or build new content around them. If you’re going to write fresh content, check the search intent and competition before you start, to give yourself a good chance of ranking highly on search engines results pages (SERPs).

Semantic SEO/ user intent

On the theme of related keywords, Google now relies much more heavily on user intent, natural speech and semantic searches than in the past.

Semantic SEO is about understanding the context and meaning behind a search, broadening your keyword research to go beyond exact matches. By incorporating related terms, variations on your target keywords and synonyms, you can optimise your content for user intent – making sure it provides the solution users are looking for.

If you want inspiration or to check that you’re on the right lines – take a look at Google’s search suggestions on the search bar at the top and Google’s Related Searches at the bottom of the page. These can give you additional keywords and areas to target.

Google Trends

Using Google Trends is a great way to identify keywords and trends which are showing early signs of becoming popular. These might currently have very little search volume, but start to peak for seasonal trends or other reasons – perhaps a link to a new film, TV show or trending book.

Check out the Trending now tab to find out what was trending in the last four hours, 24 hours, 48 hours or seven days in the UK or your target market. This will also give you information on the search volume, which may be relatively low, but if the percentage is up massively, it’s worth keeping track of it!

For example, on 6 ^th March 2025, searches for ‘Glastonbury 2025’ were up 1000% because the line-up had just been announced. If you had any products which would be in any way relevant to Glastonbury – from wellies to portable phone chargers to healthy snacks or dry shampoo – this was the time to incorporate Glastonbury into your content.

Once you’ve identified these untapped opportunities, you need to act fast to get ahead of the game before the keywords are everywhere! Write new content around the emerging trends or adapt you existing content to include them.

If the emerging trend is seasonal, start preparing your relevant content in advance to make sure you publish just ahead of the peak season.

Advanced keyword research is ever-changing and an endless cycle of learning and making changes. To make advanced keyword research work for you, you need to be prepared to devote time to getting it right and to continue monitoring both your own performance and that of your competitors and keep optimising your content as trends and algorithms change.

But by using long-tail keywords, checking out the competition, analysing user intent and following relevant trends, you can gain a competitive edge and get ahead in the ever-evolving world of SEO.

The role of user experience (UX) in SEO success

Mon, 20 Jan 2025 13:55:07 GMT

While different disciplines, UX is becoming increasingly important to SEO success. It isn’t a direct ranking factor in SEO, but there is a strong relationship between the two.

User experience, commonly known as UX, is all about providing a smooth and enjoyable experience for a user when they land on a website. SEO (short for search engine optimisation) is about driving traffic to a website from search engines like Google.

As users navigate websites, SEO addresses their problems and queries, while UX addresses navigational issues.

SEO aims to drive organic traffic to a website and improve its position on a search engine results page (SERP). When you type a query into Google or another search engine, it will give a list of websites ranked in order of relevance and quality. The top few results will generally have Ad next to them. Companies have paid to be in that position, but the websites listed below have ranked organically as a result of their SEO work.

It's not so long since SEO was all about keywords and backlinks. Companies started filling their sites with large numbers of irrelevant keywords and poor quality backlinks in an attempt to rank higher on SERPs. These practices were no indication of the quality of the website, the company or its products and services.

What is UX?

UX is about how a user interacts with a website and how easy and convenient that website is to use. It takes into account a lot of factors which make a website easier to use.

UX includes elements such as site speed, navigation, content, layout and design, including mobile-responsive design.

Ease of navigation is essential for the vast majority of internet users. If they can’t navigate your site to find what they want quickly and easily, they will go back to Google and find another website which can help them!

Most users prefer as few clicks as possible to get to where they want to go. Ideally, every page on a website should be no more than four clicks away from the home page.

Waiting for a page to load is one of the most frustrating things a user can experience while online, particularly when using a smartphone. If you want to keep users on your site, load time should be no more than 2.5 seconds.

The difference in good and bad UX can be translated directly into the number of conversions and sales a website makes. Good UX makes for happy customers, who will keep coming back for more.

How UX and SEO work together

The goals of UX and SEO go hand in hand – creating accessible websites which are easy and enjoyable to use and give users the answers they are looking for.

To keep your website ranking highly on search engines, you need to keep users on your site – and to keep users on your website, you need to provide them with a good UX.

Search engines prioritise delivering the best possible experience to users, so websites with excellent UX are more likely to rank higher on Google.

Search engine algorithms consider how users interact with a website, to learn if it provides a valuable experience and whether it should therefore be ranked highly on SERPs.

If the algorithm notices that multiple users leave a website within seconds of landing, this will be interpreted as a website which isn’t providing a good experience or relevant information. That website will slip down the rankings to make way for competitors which seem to provide a better UX.

On the flip side, if users spend a lot of time on a website, explore multiple pages and engage with different elements of the site, search engine algorithms will interpret this as being a website which provides a positive user experience, which will help enhance its position on a SERP.

Five key UX areas you may need to improve to impact your SERP ranking are:

Responsive/ mobile-friendly design – according to Statista, mobile accounts for approximately half of web traffic worldwide. In some countries and among some demographics, this will be considerably higher. Responsive design is the process of designing a website which adapts depending on the visitor’s device - desktop, laptop, tablet or smartphone. Developers adapt the website to ensure use users can browse a website within the constraints of their device. The website’s functionality remains the same, but the content and structures adjust to the different screen sizes.
Page speed – page speed is a proven ranking factor for Google. Websites which take a long time to load are terrible for UX and will negatively impact SEO. If your website is loading too slowly, you might need to enlist the help of an external company to update it.
Web copy – Google takes into account how long users spend on your site or how quickly they leave (bounce rate). The better the quality of your copy, the easier it will be for them to find what they’re looking for and the longer they will stay on your website, which is an SEO win!
Navigation and layout – your navigation and layout should be designed in a way which makes finding their way around your site intuitive for users – providing a clear and logical path to help them find the information they need, understand it easily and then take the desired action. Individual pages too should be laid out clearly with menus, headers and calls to action (CTAs).
UI design – UI design goes hand in hand with UX, but it focuses on the visuals of a website while UX design handles the functionality. UI design includes things like colour, typography, images, logos and spacing.
Some ways to analyse whether your UX is effective, based on users’ behaviour are
Dwell time – the amount of time a user spends on your website from when they leave the SERP until they return to the SERP. The longer they stay, the more likely it is that your site is providing them with the answers they need.
Bounce rate – the percentage of users who leave your website without navigating to another page. A higher bounce rate indicates less effective UX and reflects both the quality of your content and your navigation.
Engagement time – the average time a webpage remains in the browser’s focus, with longer engagement times indicating higher levels of user interest. A decrease in engagement time can highlight areas for improvement in your UX.

If you don’t have the skills or capacity within your organisation to analyse and act on these metrics, it makes sense to use an outside company, such as Cotswold Web to help.

In 2025, UX plays a really key role in SEO. Once a visitor lands on your site, they will usually decide whether to stay or go within seconds. A positive user experience, including fast loading times, easy navigation and helpful and engaging content, can reduce bounce rates and increase dwell times. These factors are all seen as an indication of a good quality website by search engine algorithms, which will reward your website with a higher ranking on SERPs.

The impact of AI on SEO: How to stay competitive in the age of algorithms

Tue, 19 Nov 2024 11:23:04 GMT

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Artificial intelligence (AI) has had a huge impact in many areas of life and SEO is no exception. While it has made online searches easier for consumers, keeping up with it and staying ahead as a business can be challenging.

As Google integrates advanced AI into its search results, businesses must rethink their SEO strategies. Understanding the future of SEO in the context of AI is essential to appear high on search rankings and remain competitive.

Traditionally, search engine optimisation (SEO) has relied largely on keyword optimisation and link building. If you sell garden products, you would make sure the phrase ‘garden products’ was used frequently throughout your website. You would also look to get some links back to your site from other websites – maybe other businesses in your local area or in a complementary sector. These traditional SEO methods are becoming less effective.

AI means search engines like Google and Bing have become better at understanding the intent behind a search, through machine learning algorithms analysing huge quantities of data, as well as natural language processing. Natural language processing doesn’t just understand the words in a query, it understands the context and intent behind it. AI can even understand synonyms, slang and regional variation in language!

When someone searches for something online, AI can analyse, interpret and predict their behaviour. So businesses have to adapt their SEO strategies to changing algorithms to stay competitive. You need to have a deeper understanding of your target audience and produce content which meets their needs and answers their queries. It is about providing the best answer to the questions your audience is asking, because AI algorithms are skilled at recognising content which meets the search intent of users and provides value. This means that content which is designed to meet specific needs, answer questions and provide the solutions to problems is more likely to rank higher in searches.

AI algorithms will prioritise content which resonates with users on a human level – with every paragraph adding more value and depth. This aligns with AI’s preference for content which engages and informs – and also helps build a stronger connection with your target audience.

In addition, AI is making voice searches (e.g. Alexa) much more effective. Voice searches tend to use more words than online searches e.g. ‘find me healthy snacks for pre-school children’ rather than just typing ‘healthy snacks’ into Google with no context. This aspect of AI will continue to grow in importance and become even more widely used.

Google AI overviews

Google’s AI overviews, sometimes known as generative results, are one way in which AI makes searches easier for visitors but could mean less traffic for businesses. When users carry out a search, an AI answer appears at the top of the page – bringing together information from several websites.

This could be bad news for businesses, as some users will find the information in the AI generated content is enough to meet their needs, meaning they don’t need to visit individual sites. This means click through rates (CTR) are declining, with a fall in organic traffic to websites.

To stay competitive, businesses need to optimise their own content for Google AI overviews. This means creating content which is accurate, comprehensive and easy for AI to digest. Being featured in these overviews means staying visible, despite the changes to searches.

Alternatively, create content which provides deeper insight, because these overviews are only a snapshot providing brief answers, and some users will want to find out more from a comprehensive, well-researched source.

Multi-step reasoning

Multi-step reasoning is another Google initiative, which shares some similarities with the AI overviews. Multi-step reasoning uses AI to break down complex queries into smaller parts, then provide comprehensive answers. If a user searches for the best garden centres in Gloucester, which offer a member discount scheme, Google can compile all the relevant information into a single answer.

This make life easier for users but is another challenge for business. If Google can give all that information at the same time, it takes away the need for users to search multiple websites for the answers they need. To stay competitive, businesses should provide in-depth information to address complex queries which AI can use to respond.

And don’t forget building a strong, recognisable brand which users will go to directly, rather than relying on Google’s AI!

AI organised results pages

For some searches, Google now offers a different layout to its search pages. A search for ‘birthday dinner Cheltenham’ will bring up restaurants and local listings, as well as Tripadvisor and ideas and recipes for eating in.

This means users no longer have to scroll through a long list of links – they can jump to the section which is of most interest to them.

This brings an added challenge for businesses. No longer are they just competing to rank high on searches, they also need to appear in relevant categories ie not just restaurants in Cheltenham, but also birthday dinners! Your SEO strategies must adapt to ensure your content fits into these categories generated by AI, as well as in the more traditional search rankings.

Planning in search results

Google AI can now help people to plan tasks – such as suggested itineraries for holidays or meal plans. AI can provide, for example, a meal plan for a week, including recipes and shopping lists. These will all be sourced from a diverse range of websites – meaning users don’t need to visit those sites themselves.

For businesses, it is important that their content is optimised for Google to pick up and use in these AI-generated plans. Content should be structured in a way which is easy for Google to incorporate, providing a sufficient level of detail.

Companies should also focus on building their online reputation by encouraging satisfied users to leave reviews and ratings. The more positive reviews a business has, the more likely Google AI is to use it in its AI-generated plans.

Integrating AI into search engines has brought about a huge change in SEO. It has shifted the focus from keywords and backlinks to a more sophisticated and nuanced understanding of user intent. For businesses, understanding and responding to these changes is essential to stay competitive in the age of algorithms.

By producing quality content, which really answers a user’s questions and addresses the context of a query, your business can stay ahead of the game.

And remember to keep up to date with all the changes and developments in AI and SEO. AI in SEO is constantly developing, meaning businesses have to stay informed and keep adapting with it.

Conducting an SEO audit: Improving your website’s performance

Tue, 01 Oct 2024 10:29:17 GMT

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An SEO audit is a way to evaluate how well your website is optimised for search engines. It will identify problems which can prevent your site from ranking well on Google and other search engines, as well as opportunities which can help it become more visible.

An SEO audit is basically an overall health check for your website, which analyses all the factors which can have an impact on your site's performance in SERPs (search engine results pages).

It will cover areas like:

· Indexing and crawlability

· Competitor benchmarking

· On-page SEO – including content and metadata

· Keyword research

· Backlink profile

By carrying out an SEO audit, you will be able to identify any gaps in your SEO and remedy any mistakes (like keyword stuffing or questionable backlinks) throughout your website. It will evaluate how friendly your website is to search engines and how easy it is for users to navigate to find exactly what they are looking for.

An audit will also enable you to check the effectiveness of your website in terms of lead generation and conversion. It is a chance to spot any missed opportunities for conversions, so you can add any relevant CTAs.

Conducting a website audit will allow you to compare your site to your competitors. It will help you to analyse how well you’re ranking against them for keywords and determine potential new sources of traffic and sales.

It is important to carry out an SEO audit on your website periodically to improve its performance. If you have the technical skills, or your website isn’t too complex, you may be able to carry out the audit yourself. But you may find it easier to get an outside company to do it on your behalf.

How to conduct a website audit

1. Run your website URL through a site audit tool

Before you get started, you will need to find a website audit tool. There are lots to choose from, include SEMRush’s Site Audit Tool (best for those with more technical experience) and HubSpot’s Website Grader, which can help to analyse how your website is performing. Another tool, SE Ranking's website audit , will evaluate every SEO metric, such as indexing, security, crawling, indexing, usability and any tech errors which will prevent your website from ranking highly in search results.

Whichever software you choose, it will test how your site is performing and give you specific recommendations to help improve it.

2. Identify SEO problems

Your website audit tool will help you identify any SEO problems. A good SEO audit is crawl-based, which means it should simulate the way Google crawls your pages. It will see all the issues related to those pages in the way Google would see them. Some issues are quite easy to fix, while some may require a more complex solution.

There are a huge number of SEO-related issues which can affect your rankings on search engines, including meta descriptions, image alt-text, keywords and headings. Issues with any of these will have a negative impact on your SEO and rankings.

An audit will help you assess all of the content on your website, including blogs, product pages and more. The audit can help you identify whether your content is ranking well in search engines and if your SEO is reflected in your traffic numbers.

3. Carry out an SEO assessment

You need to audit the content you're publishing to make sure it's actually solving your visitors' problems. Here, the tool you use can give you guidance, but getting a fresh pair of eyes on your content can also help.

Consider your website content from the point of view of your target audience:

Did this information answer all my questions?
Does it give me all the resources I need for this topic?
Do I know what to do next?

With good SEO, you should always aim to leave the reader with immediately actionable next steps – whether that is a clear CTA (call-to-action) or links to resources.

4. Follow on-page SEO best practice

There are three types of SEO:

On-page SEO are the elements which are on your webpage, which allow search engines to crawl and index it. It is called ‘on-page’ because it can be seen by visitors on the page!
Off-page SEO includes social media and external linking.
Technical SEO is more of the behind-the-scenes stuff, which you may need external help with – like site speed, mobile readiness and structured data.

On-page SEO tells Google and other search engines all about your website and how you provide value to visitors and customers. It helps your site be optimised for both search engines and human eyes.

You should make sure all your webpages are following on-page SEO best practice.

On-page SEO is completely in your control. There are a lot of elements to it. The more of them you optimise, the more you will increase your traffic and conversions. Prioritise the elements which are most important to you in reaching your business goals.

The on-page SEO elements are:

Keyword research
Visual content (copy and pictures)
Page titles
Headers
Meta descriptions
Image alt-text
Structured markup
Page URLs
Internal linking

5. Check for indexing problems

If pages aren’t indexed in Google’s database, Google can’t rank them.

To see whether your pages are indexed, check for issues directly in Google Search Console.

Head to the Pages report under the Index section. This will show you a graph of all pages based on their indexing status.

It will also show you a list of reasons why pages haven’t been indexed. Go through these reasons and check the pages which are covered by the reasons.

Remember, it is actually normal to have some URLs which aren’t indexed. You only need the ones you want to rank in search results to be indexed.

6. Analyse internal links

Internal links are a key part of an SEO audit, as they have an important role to play on your website:

They help search engines crawl your site
They help visitors navigate around your website
They help to direct link equity (a search engine ranking factor based on the idea that certain links pass value and authority from one page to another - may also be called authority or link juice) to the most important pages

A good audit tool will list any issue relating to internal links and information on how to fix them. It will pick up on pages which don’t have enough internal links (so you can point more internal links to them) and pages which have good internal links, so you can use them to distribute link equity to other pages.

7. Benchmark against your competitors

A good SEO audit should help benchmark your website against your competitors. Some audit tools will give you the option to compare your domain with your competitors. This will show whether you are doing better than them or lagging behind.

Key areas to focus on are:

Authority score: the overall quality of the domain on a scale of 1 to 100 (based on factors including backlinks and search traffic)
Organic keywords: how many keywords your competitor ranks for
Organic traffic: how much organic traffic your competitor receives
Referring domains: how many different domains link to your competitor’s domain (this provides a more comprehensive picture for comparison than the overall number of backlinks)

8. Highlight missing keywords

To audit your content for on-page SEO, carry out a keyword analysis:

Use an analytics tool to review your keyword performance. Which keywords are giving you the biggest gains in leads and traffic?
Are you creating enough relevant content to target those keywords on your website?
Review basic on-page SEO elements including URLs, copy, page titles and meta descriptions. Make sure keywords are included where relevant (but don’t stuff your content with irrelevant keywords because that will have the opposite effect!).

Carrying out an SEO audit is an opportunity to look at the keywords your competitors target – and most importantly whether you are missing out on any opportunities.

A good audit tool will allow you to compare your site with your competitors and highlight any keywords relevant to your business which are either missing (your competitors rank for them, but you don’t) or weak (your competitors rank more highly for them than you do).

This will highlight any keyword opportunities you may have missed out on, so you can optimise them to improve traffic and conversions.

Focus on the pages which bring the most conversions and the keywords which are most important to your business.

9. Carry out an SEO link audit

An SEO link audit processes the links pointing to your website to find any issues or opportunities in your backlink profile. (A backlink profile is the collection of links from other websites which direct visitors to your site. There are good and bad backlinks.) Evaluating these links will help you optimise your site to rank for your target keywords.

SEO link audits consider the URL source, domain and anchor text to see if value is being passed to your website. This will gauge how much a link is helping or hurting your website's visibility in SERPs (search engine results pages). Links from well-known, respected websites are much more valuable than links from smaller sites.

To conduct an SEO link audit, gather all of your link data, using Google Search Console :

Enter your domain and click on Links to Your Site under Search Traffic
Download the latest links and create a link audit spreadsheet
Manually evaluate your links, considering factors like anchor text, page content and IP address or use a tool like Ahref's backlink checker to analyse the value of the links

10. Create a website audit report

Your website audit tool will create a report which clearly states the issues found on your site and how to improve them. This will allow you to start making improvements – or for a team member or outside agency to make them on your behalf.

Conducting an SEO audit can be a time-consuming process, but with the right tools, it can make a real difference to the performance of your website – and increase conversions and sales.

When you start your audit, you will want to know how well your site is performing and how it compares to your competitors. A good SEO audit will give you the answers to those questions and a starting point to make changes to optimise your website.

If it all seems too complicated, it is worth using an outside company like Cotswold Web to do the work for you. We have all the expertise and access to the latest tools to optimise your website to make sure it really converts.

Redesigning your website: When and why your business needs it

Tue, 30 Jul 2024 08:35:47 GMT

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When was the last time you redesigned your business website (or got a team of experts to do it for you)? If it was more than two or three years ago, the chances are it needs doing again.

The online world moves fast and, in that time, there have been some big changes in both technology and design. So your website needs to move with the times and evolve. It might just need a few tweaks, but sometimes a full redesign and a brand-new website is the answer.

If it is no longer meeting the needs of your customers and your business (maybe you’ve noticed a fall in traffic or purchases?) you should consider a redesign sooner rather than later.

Don’t ever think web design is just about the way your site looks. While the aesthetic of your website is important, it is just a fraction of what you need to change when redesigning your website.

A successful website redesign is about aligning design decisions and your site’s functionality with the goals and needs of your target audience. A redesign can offer a better user experience and better functionality. It is a chance to optimise your pages to drive more traffic to your site.

If you feel like your website no longer fulfils your business goals, it must be time for a change!

Here are some clues that you need to redesign your why website…

Users struggle with navigation

When people visit your website, you want them to be able to move around easily. They need to be able to find the information they need quickly, especially the products they want to buy or the services they want to book!

If it’s too challenging, they will leave your site and go to a competitor whose website is more user-friendly and you have lost a valuable lead.

If your navigation is difficult, your website needs a redesign so that navigation is quick and easy and keeps prospective customers on your site for longer. Clear calls-to-action (CTA) will make it easy for visitors to navigate your site and more likely they will become customers.

Visitors are leaving your site quickly

When you get visitors to your website, you want them to stick around for a while, to make sure they get all the information they need. If they are leaving quickly without converting or making a purchase, especially if they are leaving more quickly than they did previously, that is a sign your website needs a redesign.

It might be a reflection of an outdated site with too many broken links, missing images and other elements not working properly, which is enough to make visitors leave.

Or it could be a sign that your website is doing a reasonable job of telling people about your business and what you do, but not so good at getting them to move on to the next stage and become a customer.

A new design should help reduce your bounce rate and turn website visits into leads for your business.

You’ve updated your brand

Your website is one (very important!) part of your brand. If you’ve updated your brand – whether a new logo, new fonts or new colours, it is essential you update your website at the same time.

When people visit your website, they want to see consistency. Your site should accurately reflect your brand, so if you’ve made any changes elsewhere, you need to redesign your website to match. Otherwise, you could lose brand recognition and potential quality leads.

Your site is slow

A slow website is a dealbreaker for many users. It only takes a fraction of a second for them to become bored and frustrated. If they don’t get the information as quickly as they want it, they are likely to head for a competitor’s website.

There are many elements of your website which could be slowing it down, including pictures, videos and coding. Using Google PageSpeed Insights will analyse your site and flag up any issues. It’s not the easiest thing to understand, so you might need the help of an external company to help understand the data and make the necessary improvements.

A website redesign from Cotswold Web can help you start afresh and optimise the site right from the start so that it loads more quickly.

You haven’t optimised for mobile

Globally, 58% of internet visits are by mobile phone. In some countries and for some sections of the population, that figure is much higher. So it’s hard to believe there are still websites in 2024 which haven’t been optimised for mobile. If your site is one of them, this is an essential redesign you need sooner rather than later.

If you notice you are getting a lot of traffic from mobiles, but they aren’t converting, this could be an indication you have a problem.

People are constantly conducting searches on their smartphones, but if they are forced to look at a desktop site on their mobiles, it will perform very badly – with users having to zoom in and out to try to read the information on the site.

Most businesses rely on traffic from Google, and mobile friendliness is one of the ranking factors for Google search engine results. It has a mobile-friendly test to decide whether a webpage is optimised for viewing on mobile devices. If a page passes the test, it is considered mobile-friendly and may have higher visibility in search results on mobile devices.

It is a lot of work to make an existing site mobile-friendly and probably makes sense to have a complete redesign, meaning you can iron out any other design issues at the same time.

Your website doesn’t reflect your product range

If you’ve recently expanded or changed your product range, it needs to be on your website! If your website doesn’t reflect your product range as it is now, you need to update it or you will miss out on potential sales.

Your website also needs to be updated if it is showing products which are out of stock – particularly if they are out of stock permanently or in the long-term. Any inaccurate information – whether not showing enough products or showing products you no longer stock – makes your brand appear incompetent. If visitors find your website to be inaccurate, they are far less likely to trust your products or services.

If your website doesn’t have the capacity to handle a much bigger product range, it could be time for a full redesign to ensure it has the capability you need.

Your competitor’s website looks better than yours!

If your competitor’s website looks better than yours – it is a no-brainer. You need to redesign your website soon! It doesn’t matter if their product range isn’t as good as yours, because a better looking website will attract more visitors and more customers, which means less customers buying from your business.

You haven’t adapted with your consumers

If your website visits or sales have fallen and there’s no other obvious reason, it could be that the needs of your target consumers have changed. As consumers get older, get married, have children, change jobs etc, their needs change. If you want to keep those customers, you need to adapt to keep up with them or focus on newer consumers who are at a different stage in their lives.

Whether you are trying to keep up with your original target market or aiming for a new target market, you will need a website redesign to attract the right audience to your business.

If any of this sounds familiar, it is time to redesign your website. You might need a brand-new site, or you might just need a few changes to make things run more smoothly. Your potential customers are looking for a website which they can navigate easily, which looks attractive and not dated, and where they can see your full product range.

If you do all of this, your website should be the one which is outdoing your competitors rather than the other way round.

Not sure where to start? Redesigning a website is a big ask if you’re not used to it and could take up a lot of your time. Here at Cotswold Web, we’ve been designing websites since the noughties. We keep up to date with the latest technology and can design a functional and beautiful website for your business which will really convert.

Local SEO: Attracting customers in your area.

Mon, 24 Jun 2024 10:54:27 GMT

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Local SEO (or search engine optimisation) is a way of allowing your business to rank highly in local search results. It helps you to stand out in your local area and compete with bigger businesses, when local people are searching for products or services like yours. It is a way of ensuring your business is the first choice for people in your area looking for what you have to offer.

It is an essential tool for local businesses. HubSpot reports that 46% of all Google searches are looking for local information. Get local SEO right and your business won’t just be visible in searches, it will be prominent!

Local SEO is especially important for a local bricks and mortar business, like a coffee shop, garage or hairdresser, or for a local company offering a service like a window cleaner or tree surgeon in a specific area.

While general SEO will always be important for businesses, local SEO is different because it targets an audience in a very specific geographical area – the audience which could become your customers!

It offers a very targeted approach to marketing. Rather than competing on a global, national or even regional scale, you are targeting a very specific geographical area – the area where your business is based, and your potential customers live and work. Done well, it will result in more customers coming through your door or placing orders online or by phone and a rise in sales.

How does it work?

Search engines like Google use a local search algorithm. This takes into account a number of key factors which will help determine where a business will rank in local search results.

The key factors are:

Proximity: how close is the user’s location to the location of the business they are searching for? If a user searches ‘coffee shops near me’, search engines will show coffee shops close to the user’s location at the top of the search results page.
Popularity: online reputation and visibility of the business, including backlinks and online customer reviews. If a business has positive customer reviews and engages actively on social media, it will boost its popularity and therefore its local SEO rankings.
Relevance: how well the business matches the user’s search terms, including keywords and business categorisation. By using relevant keywords and accurate information on your website and Google My Business, you can enhance your company’s relevance.

As a business looking to maximise the effectiveness of local SEO, it’s important to meet as many of these criteria as possible.

Google My Business

One of the most important things you can do for local SEO isn’t even on your own website. Optimising your free Google My Business (GMB) profile is essential for local businesses looking to reach a larger audience - especially as it controls your business’s visibility on Google searches and Google Maps.

GMB brings together the ways Google can help your company to stand out in one, easy-to-use location. Your job is to optimise it and make it work as well as possible for your business! Start by claiming and verifying your GMB listing if you haven’t already.

A well put together Google My Business profile can operate as a digital shopfront for your business. It should be interesting and attractive enough for potential customers to want to take a second look.

Your profile should include accurate, up-to-date information, including the business name, address (it’s a good idea to also include a map) and a local phone number (not just a mobile number), as well as opening hours, photos and customer reviews.

Regularly updating and posting on your GMB profile will show Google that your company is active, which is favoured by the search engine. You can add high quality photos to your GMB profile to showcase your products or services and show the exact location of your shop, if you have one. You can also respond to reviews, messages and questions on your listing to show your value customer feedback and help to boost your reputation online.

Local keyword research

When it comes to attracting local customers to your business, you need to pick the right keywords. Brainstorm all the words which would be relevant to both your business and the local area – so not just ‘hairdresser’ or ‘barber’, but also ‘Cheltenham’, ‘Gloucestershire’ and ‘Cotswolds’ or even the name of the local neighbourhood. Are there any local dialect or slang words you could also use as keywords, which would be recognised by very local customers?

If brainstorming and chatting to your team for ideas isn’t enough, there are tools online which can help you come up with the right keywords.

Don’t forget to check which keywords your main local competitors are using, so you can identify their strengths and weaknesses. Can you borrow any of their ideas? Can you differentiate your business and do better than them?

Once you have your keywords, make sure they are dotted strategically throughout your website – in the main content, but also in URLs, captions to photos and meta tags. They will all serve as signposts pointing local customers your way when they are actively searching for businesses like yours in the local area.

Create local content

Creating local content on your website will help local people relate to your brand. Your blog is an effective way to target relevant local keywords. It is also a useful channel to highlight local events and news which matter to the community. This will boost your site’s relevance and help to create connections between your business and local people – increasing the likelihood of turning them from visitors into customers.

Local backlinks

Getting backlinks to your website from well-respected local sites is a big boost to your local SEO. Backlinks can come from a range of sources, including local news sites, other local businesses, local event sites or local listings/ directories. It is important to focus on sites which are relevant to your business. When it comes to backlinks, think quality over quantity!

Sponsoring an event or a grassroots sports team in your area will help you to be seen as an active participant in the community and generate word-of-mouth marketing – as well as potentially coverage in the local media.

Encourage happy customers to share their experiences with your business on sites like Google My Business and Tripadvisor. While these aren’t specifically local sites, the links are valuable for your SEO – especially if you respond to the reviews, whether good or bad. This shows that you care about your customers’ experience, helping to build trust in your business.

Check that all information about your business across external websites is accurate and consistent. Inconsistencies can prove confusing for customers and have a negative impact on your search rankings.

Locality specific landing pages

If your business has more than one location, creating individual landing pages for each geographical area will boost local SEO. These should all have the name, address and phone number of the specific location.

Use the dedicated landing pages for content tailored to the local audience to help boost your chances of ranking highly in local search results.

Local SEO is an essential for any business which wants to stand out from the crowd in the local area. It is about making sure that, when someone is searching for the products or services you provide locally, your business is the first one to pop up. It is also a way of strengthening connections with your local community.

By optimising your Google My Business profile and your own website, focusing on local keywords and backlinks, you are doing all you can to attract customers from your local area and grow your business.

Automating your business with Connectors

Thu, 23 May 2024 11:28:13 GMT

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Marketing your business is powered by data – and your company needs that data to stay ahead of the competition. Businesses which make extensive use of customer analytics are more likely to beat the competition – in making sales and retaining customers.

A website is just one part of your business’s marketing strategy, although an essential one. It supports many of your other marketing strategies, including PPC advertising campaigns and your social media.

Your business website shouldn’t be a static tool. It needs to keep changing, developing and moving with the times, so that you can keep getting the maximum benefits from it – however small or large your business.

But some digital marketing techniques can seem too expensive or too time consuming for small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs). Without the right tools at the right price, can they stay in the game, when faced with competition from big businesses with big budgets?

One new tool Cotswold Web is now using in its web designs for SMEs is Duda Connectors. By integrating Connectors into your website design, you can overcome the biggest barriers to advanced digital marketing for your business – a lack of time, a lack of expertise and a lack of money!

Connectors can automate many essential business functions – automating data transfer between your professionally designed website and your preferred tools and apps. So Connectors will communicate directly and in real-time to tools like Mailchimp, Slack, Salesforce or Hubspot.

Using Connectors, an email could be sent by Mailchimp as soon as certain triggers are reached or leads will be automatically recorded in Hubspot, following a sale or on completion of a form. Connectors can send a Slack message to you to alert you to an enquiry from a potential customer.

And that is just the tip of the iceberg. Connectors can do more, and we have no doubt that it will keep doing more and more in future, as it is developed further.

For a small business, this hands-free integration will make a huge difference – helping to cross-sell products and retain customers in a way which wouldn’t have previously been possible with limited time and a limited budget. Having this automated tool doing your work for you will also free up your team’s time to work on other aspects of growing your business.

Connectors can take your business up a gear, turning your website into a high-functioning site which can make marketing and organic outreach work for you better than ever before.

Talk to us about how we can create a professional website for you, using Duda Connectors to automate your business and take it to a whole new level.

SEO vs PPC: Which delivers better ROI for your marketing budget?

Tue, 26 Mar 2024 10:07:47 GMT

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The best way to drive traffic to your website for most businesses is through search engines, so it is essential to secure a prominent position on a Search Engine Results Page (SERP). The two ways to do this are through search engine optimisation (SEO) and pay-per-click (PPC) advertising.

The two options offer a different approach to generating leads and sales. Depending on what you are looking to achieve, either PPC or SEO might be better at reaching your business goals.

With PPC, businesses bid on relevant keywords to appear as a sponsored link at the top of SERPs. When visitors search for those keywords, the ad will be displayed in the sponsored results section. A business only pays for the ad if the link is clicked. The most popular ads are Google Ads, but advertising on Facebook, LinkedIn (ADD LINK - Why you need LinkedIn paid ads for your business (cotswoldweb.co.uk)) (ADD LINK - Facebook Ads: Measure your conversions! (cotswoldweb.co.uk)) or other social media can be just as effective, depending on your own target audience.

SEO is a long-term strategy to generate clicks without having to pay for them directly. It is about optimising your website content around relevant target keywords to convince a search engine that your business is a leading authority on a particular subject.

Here we will discuss the pros and cons of each, and which delivers the better return on investment (ROI) for your marketing budget.

One way to help you make a decision on which is the best option for your business is to check out the competition. They are targeting the same audience as you, so you can learn from their successes and their failures. If your competitors are investing heavily in PPC, it could indicate it would work well for your business too. And on the flipside, if they are ranking well in search results, investing in SEO could be the way forward.

PPC pros

PPC is the quickest way to appear at the top of the SERP. Businesses pay to appear in a prominent position, generating instant visibility and traffic and, hopefully, instant sales and conversions. It works well for new products and new businesses, which haven’t had time to achieve a first page listing on search engines like Google or Bing.
PPC can work very well and be cost-effective for a small local business targeting a small geographical area with a small number of keywords.
PPC works well for products which need less research, which will often be lower value, higher volume items.
If your main business goal is brand awareness, PPC can give your business immediate visibility.
PPC gives you a lot of control over your messaging and targeting. This means you can target your ads to reach the exact demographic of your ideal buyer – from geographical location to industry type, age, gender, interests and more - so your ads get seen by the right people at the right time, maximising your ROI. And if your ads aren’t working, you can change the content at short notice within your budget.
PPC gives you access to analytics so you can really track the performance of each individual ad and calculate your ROI. This means you can identify what works and what doesn’t, so you can allocate your budget to achieve the best possible results.
Advertisers have full control of their own PPC budget and can set daily or monthly spending limits. They can also adjust bids for specific keywords and pause campaigns when they want to.

PPC cons

PPC requires constant investment. It can be quite expensive, especially if you are bidding on a keyword popular with other businesses. Then you have to ask yourself whether you are really getting the ROI you want, particularly if the ad is for a low value product.
PPC is a short-term strategy – if you stop paying, your business will immediately disappear from searches. So your choices are either to start relying more on SEO or to keep paying for your ads!

SEO pros

SEO doesn’t incur direct costs per visit. If you can manage SEO within your business, it is ‘free’, with the only cost being staff time. A well optimised blog can bring visitors to your website for many years, saving money and reducing your reliance on paid ads.
Although paid ads will appear higher on searches than organic search results, visitors will usually trust organic searches more than adverts, so investing in SEO to get higher on searches could be a worthwhile investment.
SEO has long-lasting benefits. If your business can rank highly on Google or other search engines for relevant keywords, it can stay there for a sustained period of time, much longer than a short-term advertising campaign.
SEO creates high quality leads, as visitors will engage and read a lot of content before making a decision to buy.
Good SEO can improve your ROI over time – as you continue to produce optimised web content, your website will rise in the rankings, leading to more clicks and increased traffic.

SEO cons

SEO doesn’t bring instant results. It can take weeks and often months for search engines to crawl and index your website before it appears high up on SERPs.
There is no guarantee of success and, for competitive keywords especially, you may never see your website rank on the first page of Google.
If you need to outsource your SEO work, it can easily be just as expensive as PPC.
It is harder to track and calculate the ROI of SEO.
Search engines often change their algorithms without warning. This means something which ranked well yesterday is suddenly not as effective today, with your website plummeting in the rankings overnight. Staying on top of the changes in SEO can be time-consuming and costly.

It would be great if there was a simple answer to the SEO vs PPC question, but it is not as straightforward as that. When trying to decide whether SEO or PPC gives you the best ROI for your marketing budget, you need to weigh up both your business goals and your available budget. If you have a limited budget, SEO could be the most cost-effective option. But if you need fast results or you have a bigger budget, investing in PPC will give your business more visibility and generate leads more quickly.

It is always important to strike a balance between the two different approaches and your own business goals. The reality is that most businesses will use a combination of SEO and PPC to give them the best results. Neither of them will do everything you need them to do independently, and they will complement each other as part of a holistic marketing strategy. Investing in SEO can help develop credibility for your brand, drive organic leads and generate long-term interest in your business, while targeted PPC can boost sales at important times, like new product launches or in the run-up to Christmas and other key trading periods.

By weighing up factors like cost-effectiveness, conversion rates and long-term results versus short-term results, you can make an informed decision around SEO and PPC, based on the unique requirements of your own business.

Why you need LinkedIn paid ads for your business

Wed, 14 Feb 2024 11:19:01 GMT

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LinkedIn might not be the first platform you think about for advertising your business. But if you’re looking for business-to-business (B2B) sales, you shouldn’t ignore LinkedIn’s paid ads.

Most online advertising is geared towards business-to-consumer (B2C) businesses. In B2C, you can rely on mass advertising and big audiences. But B2B is all about being more focused on finding the right people.

LinkedIn has an audience of 850 million professionals. They are potential customers for your B2B business. (For comparison, there are just over 3 billion Facebook users, but the demographic of Facebook is much more mixed, and its advertising is far more relevant than to a B2C audience.)

While your own (or your company’s) LinkedIn profile might be active, your posts will only reach your direct connections. If direct connections comment on or share your post, it might then reach second- or third-degree connections. But it’s not going to reach even a fraction of the audience you want to target. Using paid ads on LinkedIn will take your reach way beyond your organic following.

B2B buying has a much longer lead time than B2C. According to LinkedIn, the average B2B sales cycle is six to nine months. Advertising in the B2B sector is about building long-term relationships. And LinkedIn helps you to do that.
LinkedIn says it helps businesses to ‘Target the professionals you care about’ and ‘Reach a qualified audience with sophisticated B2B targeting’.

According to its own data:

180 million senior-level influencers are on LinkedIn
Four out of five LinkedIn members drive business decisions
LinkedIn audiences are six times more likely to convert
LinkedIn’s audience has double the buying power of the average web audience
40% of B2B marketers see LinkedIn as the most effective channel for driving high quality leads

LinkedIn has a ready-made audience of professionals, a variety of ad types and the right data to help you target your advertising to reach the right audience.

LinkedIn’s audience data is what it calls ‘deep zero-party data’. In other words, the data has been provided by LinkedIn members themselves – so it is trustworthy, accurate and frequently updated. This means your ads can be targeted at a very specific audience.

Creating LinkedIn ads

To create ads on LinkedIn, you need a LinkedIn company page – not just your own personal profile.

To ensure you reach the right audience, LinkedIn paid ads give you a choice of:

Target audience
Advertising campaign objectives
Advertising formats

Combining these together increases conversion rates because your advertising is very focused.

For all LinkedIn ads, you need to specify where in the world you want them to be seen. This can be as wide as the whole country or as specific as a particular town or city.

You can further refine your target audience with the demographics you want to reach, including education, work experience, seniority, company size and interests.

LinkedIn also allows you to target your advertising at specific industries though audience selection. The category ‘Company industry’ means you can focus on members who work in a particular sector. (The one small downside of this is, where a company operates in several sectors, only the primary industry sector listed on its LinkedIn profile will be recognised.)

LinkedIn offers three different advertising objectives, to help businesses build their advertising around specific goals.

They are:

Awareness – get your brand name known
Consideration – if your brand is already familiar to your audience, this will help with website visits, engagement, visits to other social media etc.
Conversion – the audience is already familiar with your brand and ready to make a decision to buy

LinkedIn has 11 different ad formats to help businesses meet their objectives.

These are:

Single image ads – look similar to regular content, but are marked as ‘promoted’. Good for brand awareness, website visits, engagement and job applications
Carousel ads – swipeable row of images to tell your brand’s story or showcase products. Use three to five images (cards) to start with and test by adding more at a later date. Good for brand awareness, website visits and lead generation
Conversation ads – like a flowchart, with the audience able to choose their own path. These can have multiple calls to action (CTAs). Good for brand awareness, website visits, engagement and lead generation
Document ads – allow you to share PDFs, presentations, reports, white papers and more. Good for brand awareness, website visits, website conversions and lead generation
Video ads – can be used to showcase your brand and products in a variety of ways. The most effective videos are 30 seconds or less. Good for brand awareness and video views (eg YouTube content)
Event ads – increase an event’s reach and highlight important details (you must first create a LinkedIn event on your page before making an event ad). Good for brand awareness, website and landing page visits and event sign-ups
Follower ads – these are dynamic ads personalised to your audience. They promote your LinkedIn page to encourage them to hit the follower button. Good for brand awareness, engagement and website visits
Lead generation forms - available for message ads and sponsored content. They help you discover more qualified leads eg by connecting a lead gen form to your CTA. Good for lead generation
Spotlight ads – highlight your products, services, content and more. These use personalisation to connect with audiences. Clicking a spotlight ad will take a visitor straight to your landing page or website. Good for brand awareness, website visits, lead generation and job applicants
Single job ads – job ads promoted directly in your audience’s news feed. These ads have a 25% increase in click to apply rate and 52% decrease in cost per applicant.
Thought leader ads – are used to promote content from a thought leader within an organisation – whether that is the founder, CEO or a team member. You can’t add headlines, explanatory text or CTAs to thought leader ads. Good for engagement and brand awareness

Whatever ad format you choose, you should craft your ad copy around a clear call to action. Your audience is busy. They want to know what to do next when they see your ad, so make it easy for them! Effective CTAs include ‘Sign up now!’, ‘Start now’ or ‘Tell me more’.

The important thing is to make sure your CTA matches the objective you originally selected for your ad (ie awareness, consideration or conversion).
Once you have selected your target audience, your ad objective and your ad format, you need to work on creating your budget and schedule. The cost to advertise with LinkedIn will vary. LinkedIn’s Campaign Manager will provide a budget range based on other competing bids for your ideal audience. This allows you to place competitive bids for your ads to win placement in the best possible positions to reach your target audience.

Campaign Manager is also where you will see how your ads are performing and converting. The initial two to four weeks of an ad campaign are generally where you find out what works and what doesn’t, so you can make changes for future ads.

If you are running a B2B company and want to reach an engaged audience of business professionals, you need to be using paid ads on LinkedIn. They are a cost-effective way to promote everything from webinars and job ads through to product and service launches.

Research by HubSpot shows that LinkedIn ads have a 6.1% conversion rate, compared to 2.58% for Google search ads. By using LinkedIn’s paid ads, you have the potential for real business success.

Facebook Ads: Measure your conversions!

Wed, 06 Dec 2023 12:43:56 GMT

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Facebook Ads are a very effective form of advertising for many businesses. But how effective? If you don’t measure your conversions, you really can’t be sure, as you will have no idea how good your return on investment (ROI) is.

How to advertise on Facebook in 2021 (cotswoldweb.co.uk)

By focusing on conversions, you can ensure you are reaching the right audience and measure your ROI to ensure you’re not paying more for a conversion than you should.

First things first – what is a conversion?

A conversion is when an ad achieves its purpose. It is an action or event which is part of a customer journey. Different businesses will have different actions which they class as conversions. The most obvious conversion is a sale, but it could also be booking a call, filling in an enquiry form or signing up for a subscription.

You can track a huge number of metrics through Facebook Ads Manager (also known as Meta Ads Manager), so it is important to focus on the ones which are most relevant to your business and what you want to achieve. If the only conversion you are interested in is purchases, there is no point in tracking any other form of conversion.

Some common conversions to focus on are:

· Website purchases

· Leads

· Downloads

· Subscription sign-ups

By doing that, you can work out how much it is costing every time to achieve that goal - known as the Cost Per Action (CPA) on Meta Ads Manager.

Facebook ads mistakes to avoid (cotswoldweb.co.uk)

Results on Meta Ads Manager are the number of times an ad campaign achieves its desired outcome ie a conversion. The result will vary from business to business and industry to industry, depending on the type of ad campaign you use and the goal you have set.

You can measure your ROI using the formula: Revenue divided by ad spend. So if you make £100 revenue and your ad spend is £10, your ROI is 10.

Conversion rate

Conversion rate is the metric used to measure the success of an ad. When you know the aim of your ad campaign, you can measure your conversion rate (sometimes known as the result rate).

This is the percentage of desired results you achieved compared to the total number of impressions. Impressions are the total number of times your ad appeared on a screen in front of your audience.

The formula for your conversion rate is the number of conversions divided by the number of impressions. This is then multiplied by 100 to give a percentage.

If your Facebook ad gets one person to buy a product for every 25 impressions, your conversion rate is 1/25 x 100, which gives a conversion rate of 4%.

Conversion rate is likely to be very different depending on whether you are aiming to reach a business to business (B2B) audience or a business to consumer (B2C) audience. Consumer products are generally cheaper and only one person needs to make the decision.

Using Facebook Ads for B2B businesses (cotswoldweb.co.uk)

Products for a B2B audience are likely to be significantly more expensive and the decision will generally be made over a longer period of time and by more than one person. But when it does convert, it will be worth the wait, with a single B2B conversion usually worth significantly more than a single B2C conversion - or even significantly more than multiple B2C conversions.

Conversion rate also varies significantly from one industry to another. A ‘good’ Facebook Ads conversion rate might be 10%, but that would be considered low in some industries and very high in others. To know what a good conversion rate for your business would be, you need to focus on industry-specific conversion data and make sure your conversions are at least in line with that, then focus on improving them.

It’s important to remember that conversion rate doesn’t account for the money made from a conversion or the money spent to achieve that conversion. If 5% of consumers are converting for two businesses, but are buying something for £10 from one business and £200 from another business, the conversion rate is still the same.

Conversion lift

Conversion lift is a service specifically offered by Facebook to its advertisers. It helps you understand the value of your Facebook Ads in driving sales and conversions (it is also used for Instagram and Audience Network ads).

Conversion lift measures conversions for the 2020s and is based on the fact that most people are switching between devices, rather than sat at the same desktop computer all day. This means cross-device conversion measurement is more important than ever, which is what conversion lift on Facebook offers.

It looks beyond traditional measurement - by measuring the impact of being exposed to an ad across devices, conversion lift offers a more holistic view of an ad's performance, rather than just relying on the number of clicks.

While people use multiple devices throughout the day, a significant proportion of purchases still happen in physical shops. Conversion lift helps you understand ad performance across multiple devices and conversion events, whether they happen online, offline or in-app.

It compares the actions of real people in randomised test and control groups to measure the additional online, offline or mobile app business driven by Facebook Ads. Companies advertising with Facebook have the option to create their own lift studies for key business questions.

All kinds of companies use Facebook to advertise from small, local businesses through to big multinationals. While some industries may see more frequent conversions, its targeting will fit all industries, as well as very localised advertising.

By measuring your conversions, you will know whether or not Facebook Ads are right for the bottom line of your business and whether you need to make any changes to your advertising strategy in the future.

Historically, Facebook Ads have always had 11 ad objectives to choose from. But from January 2024, that is being simplified to six, which should align with a business or organisation’s goals.

Google Ads: Measure your conversions!

Wed, 18 Oct 2023 12:23:14 GMT

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You can invest as much time and money as you like into Google Ads. But if you don’t measure conversions, you will have no idea how effective they are for your business and how good your return on investment (ROI) is.

A conversion happens every time your ad achieves its purpose. This isn’t just a sale. In fact, for many business to business (B2B) companies, booking a call or a prospective customer filling in an enquiry form is an important conversion.

As a business, you decide on what counts as a conversion depending on your own business goals. Each business will have its own higher value conversions, which won’t be the same as those of other businesses.

It is essential to always measure these conversions. It is the one definitive way of checking whether your ads are leading to those meaningful actions you want potential customers to take.

Tracking your conversions

Google Ads work just as well for start-ups and SMEs as they do for big businesses Can Google Ads work for small businesses? (cotswoldweb.co.uk) When you set up your Google Ads (which used to be known as Google AdWords), you need to set up conversion tracking to see how effectively ad clicks lead to a particular action – including phone calls, downloads, sales and newsletter sign-ups.

You can also set a conversion value when you set up your ads. This should be a specific customer action that is valuable to your business. Conversion values can either be the same value for each conversion (static values) or different values for each specific transaction (dynamic values).

The process of setting up Google Ads is different depending on what sort of conversion you want to track. You can also set up a different conversion action for each sort of conversion you want to monitor, so one conversion action could track phone calls to your business and another could track sales. If you’re not sure how to do it, Google Ads will take you through the process of setting up your conversion measurements when you set up your ads.

The conversion data will show you how often the ads lead to people performing the action you want them to perform.

All Google Ads users can and should monitor their ROI ie how much they have to spend to get a prospective customer to perform the action they want them to perform.

With sales, it’s pretty straightforward to measure. If you spend £10 on clicks to get a sale of £100, you’ve made a £90 profit from your ads – a good ROI.

With other forms of conversion, it is slightly harder to track. But if you spend £10 to get one phone call and it takes 10 phone calls to make a £2,000 sale, that’s £1,900 ROI.

And those other phone calls might come back to your business in a month, two months or a year, after they have spent time talking to other businesses and weighing up their options.

Conversion values

A conversion value is a monetary numerical value attached to a specific conversion, based on its value to your own individual business. Assigning conversion values will help you track your return on investment of a particular ad campaign, which will also help with decision making for the future – helping you to optimise your ads to achieve the highest value conversion for your business.

Dynamic conversion values can help to identify the true value of a keyword.

If keyword 1 has driven 100 conversions and keyword 2 has driven only 20, it might appear that keyword 1 is the most valuable.

But if keyword 1 has driven conversions valued at £10 each and keyword 2 has driven conversions valued at £100 each, keyword 2 has earned the business £2,000, while keyword 1 has only earned £1,000.

Tracking conversions in this way will help a business to allocate ad spend in the best way to generate the highest ROI.

Conversion values in Google Ads are mainly used for leads which directly drive sales, where it easier to measure a monetary value to the conversion. For a phone call or lead generation form, which many B2B businesses are aiming for, it won’t always be easy to attribute a monetary value to these conversions. Instead, these conversions can be referred to as key performance indicators or KPIs.

What is a ‘good’ conversion rate?

The conversion rate is the percentage of website visitors that perform your desired goal for each ad interaction.

The average conversion rate for Google Ads is 3.75%, but this masks big differences between industries. Data from 2022 shows a conversion rate of over 15% for animals and pets, compared to just over 2% for fashion and jewellery.

So a ‘good’ conversion rate is very specific to a particular industry.

You can track your conversion rate by dividing the number of conversions by the total number of interactions with your ad.

So if 40 visitors converted out of 2,000 who interacted with the ad, you would divide 40 by 2,000, giving you 0.02 – or 2%. For a low-cost consumer product, that rate would almost certainly be too low. But for a big ticket B2B service, that could be a very acceptable conversion rate.

You can read more about making your Google Ads campaigns more profitable here Google Ads tips to make your campaigns more profitable (cotswoldweb.co.uk)

If you are running Google Ads which don’t convert, you are wasting your money and time. If you don’t know how well they are converting, you need to start tracking your conversions straightaway.

Once you are tracking your conversions, you can adjust your spending and the way you optimise your ads to achieve a better ROI for your business.

Fully responsive web design for your B2B professional services business

Wed, 20 Sep 2023 11:44:52 GMT

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Using your website to promote your professional services business and sell to other businesses (business to business or B2B) is different from selling services direct to consumers (B2C).

The cost involved for your customers is usually a lot higher than for consumer goods and services. Buying from another business is generally a big decision made over a longer period of time and often by a number of people.

To compete in a competitive B2B marketplace, you need a clear and concise, fully responsive website, which can really showcase what you have to offer.

Cotswold Web has worked on the website design of a variety of B2B professional services businesses from accountants to copywriting and IT services.

Web design for B2B businesses is surprisingly cost effective and can make a real difference to your bottom line.

Here are some of the fully responsive professional services business websites Cotswold Web has worked on…

The Crowd Agency https://www.thecrowdagency.com

The Crowd Agency is a student marketing specialist, which can get clients’ products in front of students. It aims to ban the boring and strive for excellence in the student market, by creating exceptional campaigns which produce meaningful results and help brands make lifelong connections with students.

The Crowd Agency has unique access to exclusive media partnerships and the Students Union Network, ensuring brands are at the heart of the student experience.

Cotswold Web designed a website for The Crowd Agency, which offers:

Fully responsive design
Secure website hosting
Bespoke checkout functionality
Automated emails based on orders
Customer grouping/ trade accounts
Reward points
Customer testimonials
SEO friendly
Bulk update products
Social media integration
Blog/ news system
Visitor statistics reports

Atema IT https://www.atema.co.uk

Founded in 2017, Atema IT prides itself on being an IT partner to a range of businesses, rather than a provider.

Atema’s solutions are meaningful, robust and cost-effective. It delivers and supports IT solutions, leaving business owners free to concentrate on growing their businesses. With a huge array of cloud-based services on offer, Atema can enhance small businesses with tools that were once only available to enterprise-level organisations.

Cotswold Web designed the website for Atema IT, including:

Fully responsive design
Bespoke checkout functionality
Automated emails based on orders
Customer grouping/ trade accounts
Reward points
Bulk update products
SEO friendly
Blog/ news system
Customer testimonials
Social media integration
Secure website hosting
Visitor statistics reports

Strong & Herd https://www.strongandherd.co.uk

Strong & Herd (S&H) LLP was formed in 1995, as a one-stop-shop for any international trade or export training, export support, import training and customs compliance requirements.

S&H works to support and upskill businesses in export, import and customs procedures, offering not only practical training, but also an outsource helpline function to companies.

S&H training courses are recognised by many UK companies as a reliable provider for their import and export staff, with courses often used as part of the induction training for new members of staff.

Cotswold Web designed a website for Strong & Herd, which offers:

Fully responsive design
Bespoke checkout functionality
Automated emails based on orders
Customer grouping/ trade accounts
Reward points
Bulk update products
SEO friendly
Blog/ news system
Customer testimonials
Social media integration
Secure website hosting
Visitor statistics reports

ICX https://www.icx.co.uk

Working with some of the UK’s largest automotive brands, ICX was created to fill the gap where companies require an outsourced solution and want to partner with an experienced company in the sector. ICX:

Provides customer contact solutions to deliver satisfaction and
increased revenue for your brand
Specialises across customer journeys in the automotive and financial
sectors
Virtual, agile and proactive partner, with experienced highly trained
staff using the latest technology
Flexibility is ideal for new entrant brands coming to market to help
them scale their business
Experience with leading companies helps to support and develop
established brands in improving their customer experience

Cotswold Web designed the website for ICX, which offers:

Fully responsive design
Bespoke checkout functionality
Automated emails based on orders
Customer grouping/ trade accounts
Reward points
Bulk update products
SEO friendly
Blog/ news system
Customer testimonials
Social media integration
Secure website hosting
Visitor statistics reports

Lepus Consulting https://www.lepusconsulting.com

Lepus Consulting provides professional, best value environmental consulting services for sustainable development.

A skilled team of professional environmental planners, ecologists and landscape architects works proactively with clients to develop high quality assessments, advice and guidance.

Lepus Consulting works on a wide range of projects from both the public and private sector. Its client base includes central government, local planning authorities, national park authorities, renewable energy sector, residential and transport sector.

Cotswold Web designed the website for Lepus Consulting, including:

Fully responsive design
Bespoke checkout functionality
Customer grouping/ trade accounts
Reward points
Automated emails based on orders
Bulk update products
SEO friendly
Customer testimonials
Social media integration
Blog/ news system
Secure website hosting
Visitor statistics reports

Digby Morris https://www.digbymorris.com

Digby Morris is an international executive search and talent acquisition consultancy, working for clients looking for senior leaders exclusively in the construction, real estate and engineering sectors.

The firm has an exceptional track-record in identifying individuals who outperform their peer group and deliver success. Its executive search services identify these unique leaders for clients.

With each client search, Digby Morris employs rigorous research and analysis, creativity and sound judgement, based on years of experience. Its consultants combine industry and functional expertise, with international reach, local insight and a deep understanding of clients’ businesses.

Cotswold Web designed the website for Digby Morris, which offers:

Fully responsive design
Bespoke checkout functionality
Automated emails based on orders
Customer grouping/ trade accounts
Reward points
Bulk update products
SEO friendly
Blog/ news system
Customer testimonials
Social media integration
Secure website hosting
Visitor statistics reports

Well-Mind https://www.well-mind.co.uk

Well-Mind is trying to break the mental health stigma.

It offers a range of mental health training courses for businesses. It can also support businesses by carrying out stress risk assessment, creating a stress, mental health and wellbeing policy and assisting in proactively managing stress in the workplace.

Cotswold Web designed the website for Well-Mind, including:

Fully responsive design
Bespoke checkout functionality
Reward points
Automated emails based on orders
Customer grouping/ trade accounts
Bulk update products
Customer testimonials
Social media integration
SEO friendly
Blog/ news system
Secure website hosting
Visitor statistics reports

Veloci-Tech https://www.veloci-tech.co.uk

Veloci-Tech is a specialist accounting firm for the tech sector working across the South West. It has been helping tech firms achieve financial clarity and accounting compliance for almost 10 years.

Veloci-Tech helps dynamic IT businesses grow and develop, by providing cloud-based accounting, strategic support and up-to-the-minute financial information.

Cotswold Web designed the website for Veloci-Tech, including:

Fully responsive design
Bespoke checkout functionality
Reward points
Automated emails based on orders
Customer grouping/ trade accounts
Bulk update products
Customer testimonials
Social media integration
SEO friendly
Blog/ news system
Secure website hosting
Visitor statistics reports

MA Copywriting https://www.macopywriting.co.uk

MA Copwriting provides on-brand and on-point copywriting, editing and graphic design services for businesses.

It provides sense-checking, editing and proofreading of clients’ in-house content in the following specialist areas:

Annual, sustainability and market reports/ studies
Policy/ process procedures and manuals
Brand magazines, editorial articles and press releases
Bid proposals
Brochures, company profiles and newsletters
Branding and re-branding collateral
Web content, blogs and news pages
Video scripts and captions

Cotswold Web designed the website for MA Copywriting, which offers:

Fully responsive design
Bespoke checkout functionality
Customer grouping/ trade accounts
Reward points
Bulk update products
Automated emails based on orders
SEO friendly
Blog/ news system
Customer testimonials
Social media integration
Visitor statistics reports
Secure website hosting

ADM Accountancy Services https://www.admaccountancy.co.uk

ADM Accountancy Services is a chartered management accountant offering a broad range of accountancy services to suit small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) and professional service contractors

From start-ups to established companies looking to expand, it can help businesses reach their full potential across Gloucestershire and the surrounding areas.

Cotswold Web designed the website for ADM Accountancy Services, including:

Fully responsive design
Bespoke checkout functionality
Reward points
Automated emails based on orders
Customer grouping/ trade accounts
Bulk update products
Social media integration
SEO friendly
Blog/ news system
Customer testimonials
Visitor statistics reports
Secure website hosting

All of these B2B professional services companies are benefiting from the advantages of having their own website professionally designed by Cotswold Web. Whatever service you provide, whether accountancy, HR, training or consultancy, your own website will be designed in exactly the right way for you. Your website will showcase your B2B professional services business in the best possible light to boost sales and long-term business relationships.

What are you waiting for? Talk to us today about a professionally designed website for your B2B business.

Fully responsive web design for your B2B business

Mon, 21 Aug 2023 11:08:15 GMT

Heading 1

Using your website to promote your business and sell to other businesses (business to business or B2B) is different from selling goods or services direct to consumers (B2C).

The cost involved for your customers is usually a lot higher than for consumer goods. Buying from another business is generally a big decision made over a period of time, often by a number of people, rather than a quick decision.

To compete in a competitive B2B marketplace, you need a clear and concise, fully responsive website, which can really showcase what you have to offer. If you get it right, it could lead to a valuable long-term relationship with another business.

Cotswold Web has worked on the website design of a variety of B2B businesses from wholesalers to contract electricians and even interior design for restaurants.

Web design for B2B businesses is surprisingly cost effective and can make a real difference to your bottom line.

Here are some of the fully responsive B2B business websites Cotswold Web has worked on…

Clarkson Evans https://www.clarksonevans.co.uk

Clarkson Evans is the largest electrical contractor serving the UK new-build housing sector. From 21 branches around the country, Clarkson Evans’ electricians wire around 24,000 new homes each year.

Clarkson Evans also offers solar PV installations for businesses, with return on investment typically achieved in seven years.

The firm employs around 850 staff and three-quarters of them work on site every day, wiring new homes. The remainder of the team carry out a variety of roles to manage Clarkson Evans’ relationships with customers, to make sure everything runs smoothly behind the scenes.

Cotswold Web designed the website for Clarkson Evans, including:

Fully responsive design
Bespoke checkout functionality
Automated emails based on orders
Customer grouping/ trade accounts
Reward points
Bulk update products
SEO friendly
Blog/ news system
Customer testimonials
Social media integration
Secure website hosting
Visitor statistics reports

Cakesmiths https://www.cakesmiths.com

Cakesmiths makes cakes and savouries for coffee shops and cafés, with a home-baked quality and taste. Cakesmiths uses only natural ingredients and no ‘life preserving nasties’.

The business offers next day delivery, using packaging which keeps cakes cool and is 100% kerb recyclable.

Cotswold Web designed the website for Cakesmiths, which offers:

Fully responsive design
Bespoke checkout functionality
Automated emails based on orders
Customer grouping/ trade accounts
Reward points
Bulk update products
SEO friendly
Blog/ news system
Customer testimonials
Social media integration
Secure website hosting
Visitor statistics reports

Q&A https://www.qa-interiordesign.co.uk

Interior design firm Q&A specialises in restaurant, café and bar design. Q&A was founded in 2006 by Stephen Quiddington, who already had 20 years of interior design experience.

With a team of like-minded creatives, Q&A is able to work directly with the client and build a strong working relationship, essential to the success of any project.

Q&A will offer its many years of experience and add value along the way to exceed clients’ expectations. A desire to give clients a more personal approach at a competitive rate has cemented the firm’s position in the industry. If you pose the questions, Q&A will provide the answers…

Cotswold Web designed the website for Q&A, including:

Fully responsive design
Customer testimonials
SEO friendly
Social media integration
Blog/ news system
Visitor statistics reports
Secure web hosting

Grant Wallis Groundworks https://www.grantwallisgroundworks.com

Grant Wallis Groundworks is a family-run business providing a full range of groundwork and piling services to commercial and domestic customers across the south of England.

The experienced team can carry out projects of all sizes from repairs to new car parks and walkways, as well as new build projects. Clients include local authorities, government departments, hotels, restaurants, nursing homes and schools.

Cotswold Web designed the website for Grant Wallis Groundworks, which offers:

Fully responsive design
Bespoke checkout functionality
Customer grouping/ trade accounts
Reward points
Bulk update products
Automated emails based on orders
SEO friendly
Blog/ news system
Customer testimonials
Social media integration
Visitor statistics reports
Secure website hosting

All of these B2B companies are benefiting from the advantages of having their own website professionally designed by Cotswold Web. Whether you provide products for wholesale or services to another industry, like the construction industry, your own website will be designed in exactly the right way for you. Your website will showcase your B2B business in the best possible light to boost sales and lucrative long-term contracts.

What are you waiting for? Talk to us today about a professionally designed website for your B2B business.

Fully responsive web design for your countryside business

Mon, 10 Jul 2023 10:28:28 GMT

Booking Software

Many countryside businesses are having to diversify these days. It’s not enough just to farm the land. You need a visitor attraction or a farm shop on site to keep the cash flowing. But how do you go about promoting your countryside business to let potential visitors know what you have to offer?
Cotswold Web has worked on the website design of a variety of countryside businesses from large country estates to family farming businesses and orchards.

Having your own website will showcase everything you have to offer far better than a site like TripAdvisor can. Your website will work alongside TripAdvisor – so if potential visitors search for your business (or stumble across it!) on the review site, they can go to your own site to find out more information.

We can also include booking software for visitors to book day visits, accompanied by the best possible photography and copy, to give potential visitors all the information they need to choose your countryside business over your competition.

Cotswold Web has worked on the web design of several countryside businesses. These professionally designed websites complement sites like TripAdvisor, so potential customers can move seamlessly from one to the other.

Web design for countryside businesses like farms, country estates and farm shops is surprisingly cost effective and can make a real difference to your bottom line.

Here are some of the fully responsive countryside business websites Cotswold Web has worked on…

Spetchley Park Estate https://www.spetchleyparkestate.co.uk

Spetchley Park Estate is a family-owned, rural estate in Worcestershire, which has been home to the Berkeley family for over 400 years.

The estate is made up of agricultural land, ancient woodland and parkland, along with residential and commercial properties, with award-winning gardens which are open to visitors.

The 30-acre gardens are open from April to November, with a mix of formal, informal and woodland gardens for walking and relaxing. The estate also offers a packed season of event and activities for all the family.

Cotswold Web designed a website for Spetchley Park Estate, which offers:

• Fully responsive design
• SEO friendly
• Bespoke checkout functionality
• Customer grouping/ trade accounts
• Automated emails based on orders
• Reward points
• Bulk update products
• Customer testimonials
• Blog/ news system
• Social media integration
• Visitor statistics reports
• Secure website hosting

Sezincote https://www.sezincote.co.uk

Sezincote is a 200-year-old Indian-style palace, set in a landscape of temples, grottoes, canals and waterfalls, reminiscent of the Taj Mahal. The palace is a surprising find at the heart of a traditional, family-run 4,500 acre Cotswold countryside estate, close to Moreton-in-Marsh and Stow-on-the-Wold in Gloucestershire.

Visitors are welcome at the house and garden at set opening times and a few special weddings are hosted every summer.

The family farms 2,000 acres of the estate, with a further three tenanted farms on the site. There are also a number of houses and small commercial properties available to rent on the estate.

Cotswold Web designed the website for Sezincote, which includes:

• Stunning bespoke design
• Full responsive
• Quick and easy to add/ edit pages
• SEO friendly
• Marketing system integration
• Social media integration
• Content migration from previous website
• 301 redirects to preserve Google rankings from previous site
• Secure web hosting
• Visitor statistics reports and analysis

Hayles Fruit Farm https://www.haylesfruitfarm.co.uk

Hayles Fruit Farm is a third-generation family-owned business on the outskirts of Winchcombe in Gloucestershire.

Originally planted in 1880, the farm continues to operate as a commercial venture, with 134 acres of mixed fruit.

As well as selling fruit to supermarkets, Hayles Fruit Farm makes its own ranges of ciders and apple juices on site.

The business has a farm shop and coffee shop (Orchard Kitchen) on site, along with a rural campsite right on the Cotswold Way. Tents, caravans and motorhomes are all welcome, whether for a single night or longer stay.

Cotswold Web designed the website for Hayles Fruit Farm, including:

· Bespoke checkout functionality

· Fully responsive design

· Automated emails based on orders

· Customer grouping/ trade accounts

· Bulk update products

· Reward points

· SEO friendly

· Customer testimonials

· Blog/ news system

· Social media integration

· Visitor statistics reports

· Secure website hosting

Love British Food https://www.lovebritishfood.co.uk

Love British Food is a small, independently funded organisation run by people with a passion for food and the beautiful British countryside that produces it.

British food is produced to the highest environmental and animal welfare standards in the world. Love British Food wants to encourage people to actively look for British food when shopping or eating out and discover the delights of the diverse and delicious food produced in Great Britain.

The aim is to create a vibrant domestic market for British food, which gives famers and food producers the confidence to invest in and develop their businesses, because they see a demand for their produce.

The website is a great resource, full of case studies and tips.

Cotswold Web designed the Love British Food website, including:

· Fully responsive design

· Bespoke checkout functionality

· Customer grouping/ trade accounts

· Reward points

· Automated emails based on orders

· Bulk update products

· SEO friendly

· Customer testimonials

· Social media integration

· Blog/ news system

· Visitor statistics reports

Emmerson Farming https://www.emmersonfarming.co.uk

Emmerson Farming is a family farming business, based in Okehampton in Devon, specialising in the production of hay and straw throughout Wales and the South West.

Emmerson Farming grows its own hay and straw from seed and also purchases it from farms in the Cotswolds. It is guaranteed weed and ragwort free and suitable for farm, equestrian and domestic use.

The business offers a delivery service, as well as a collection service from the farm in Devon.

Emmerson Farming has a flock of north country mule ewes and an Angus beef breeding programme. It often has breeding stock available for sale.

Cotswold Web designed the website for Emmerson Farming, which offers:

· Bespoke checkout functionality

· Fully responsive design

· Automated emails based on orders

· Reward points

· Customer grouping/ trade accounts

· Bulk update products

· SEO friendly

· Customer testimonials

· Social media integration

· Blog/ news system

· Secure website hosting

· Visitor statistics reports

All of these countryside businesses are benefiting from the advantages of having their own website professionally designed by Cotswold Web. For a farm, farm shop, country estate or any other countryside business, your own website will be designed in exactly the right way for you, showcasing it in the best possible light, to boost sales or bookings.

What are you waiting for? Talk to us today about a professionally designed website for your countryside business.

Booking software for your small holiday business

Tue, 13 Jun 2023 09:50:50 GMT

Booking Software

If you run a small holiday business, whether a single room on Airbnb or a camping or glamping site, and you don’t have your own website, you are missing a trick.

Sites like Airbnb, Booking.com and Tripadvisor are all useful ways to advertise your business and allow customers to book a stay with you. But there is nothing quite like your own website, complete with booking software, for people to book direct.

Having your own website doesn’t stop travellers from booking through Airbnb, Booking.com or Tripadvisor, but it is another way of boosting your business. People will probably search for campsites, apartments and glamping on these sites, but if they can also find a stunning holiday accommodation website, that is a real game changer.

There isn’t always quite enough space to give all the relevant information you want to share on sites like Airbnb. But web design for holiday accommodation will show your business exactly as you want your customers to see it – with the best possible photography and copy – giving them confidence to make a booking.

Cotswold Web has worked on the website design of a number of holiday accommodation businesses, including glamping and apartments. These professionally designed sites work alongside Airbnb and the other channels, so that prospective customers can move seamlessly from one to the other.

Web design for holiday apartments, campsites and glamping sites is surprisingly cost effective and can make a real difference to your bottom line.

Whether bookings are made through your website or through one of the other sites, like Booking.com, availability is updated instantly, so there are never any concerns about double booking.

Not sure if your own accommodation website is right for your business?

Here’s some of the holiday websites we have worked on at Cotswold Web, all of which include booking software so customers can book directly…

Neptune Apartments https://www.neptuneapartments.co.uk

Neptune Apartments is a stunning collection of 12 individually designed apartments for business or leisure in the heart of Cheltenham.

The website really paints a picture of the accommodation through stunning photography – although many of the reviews on the website say it is even better in real life!

Neptune Apartments’ website gives all the essential information visitors could need about both the accommodation and the town.

Bowbrook Holidays https://www.bowbrooklodges.co.uk

Bowbrook Holidays is a 30-acre glamping site near Pershore in Worcestershire. The site boasts a range of luxury glamping pods for short breaks or relaxing weeks away in the countryside.

There are also caravan and motorhome pitches on site.

Without Bowbrook’s own website, prospective holidaymakers probably wouldn’t know about the hot tubs and fully fitted kitchens included with the luxury glamping pods or the site’s own nature reserve and fruit trees.

The website also gives lots of additional information about places to visit and eat in the local area, giving far more detail than on sites like Airbnb.

Woodchester Valley Vineyard https://www.woodchestervalleyvineyard.co.uk/visit

The award-winning vineyard in the Stroud Valleys has a range of exclusive accommodation available to book.

The three Vineyard Barns sleep two each, the spacious farmyard – The Retreat - sleeps up to four and is perfect for longer stays and those with pets, while Woodchester Valley House sleeps up to 12 in six rooms.

The website brings the accommodation to life with beautiful photography and lots of useful information about booking, to make it a really straightforward process for visitors.

Cherry Tree Glamping https://www.cherrytreeglamping.co.uk

Cherry Tree Glamping is a glamping site on the edge of the Cotswolds, close to the Gloucestershire market town of Stroud.

With its own luxury glamping lodges, as well as a 25-pitch campsite, the website really paints a picture of the site and what it has to offer – from exclusive use of the site to eggs from Cherry Tree’s own chickens!

The website offers far more than travellers would find on Airbnb or Booking.com and includes lots of tips for places for visitors to visit and eat, whatever their interests.

The George Inn https://www.thegeorgebarford.co.uk/stay

The George Inn in Barford St Michael near Banbury, Oxfordshire, is a country dining pub on the edge of the Cotswolds. It also offers nine individually decorated bedrooms.

The George combines the understated luxury and little touches of a five-star hotel, with the welcoming charm of a village pub. With accessible rooms, dog friendly rooms and a delicious breakfast, it offers something for everyone.

The George Inn’s professionally designed website gives visitors a real feel for its guest accommodation, and for the delicious food on offer at the pub!

Treeopia https://www.treeopia.co.uk

Treeopia offers something very special – luxury treehouse accommodation on Parsons Hall Farm in the Worcestershire countryside.

Treeopia’s two sustainably designed treehouses - Vivianna and Eathelin – combine the luxury of a five-star hotel with the simple pleasures of nature. They each offer a high-end, handmade, fully equipped bespoke kitchen, bedroom with super king-sized bed and an opulent bathroom with rainfall power shower.

Treeopia’s own website shares not just photos and descriptions of the stunning accommodation, but also lots of information on the backstory and sustainability credentials of Treeopia’s treehouses.

All these small holiday businesses are benefiting from the advantages of having their own website, professionally designed by Cotswold Web. For a campsite, glamping site or any holiday accommodation business, your own website will be designed in exactly the right way for you and show it in the best possible light to customers to boost bookings.

What are you waiting for? Talk to us today about a professionally designed website for your small holiday business.

How ChatGPT can help your business

Fri, 19 May 2023 10:41:55 GMT

Getting started

To get started, simply head over to the ChatGPT website or download and set up an account.

Once your account is confirmed, you can get to work!

Configure your ChatGPT settings, including the language, response time and tone of the chatbot
Integrate it into your website’s chat function or social media channels
Input queries or prompts to ChatGPT and let it generate a response
Review and edit the response to ensure accuracy and relevance
Repeat the process to assist with a variety of tasks
ChatGPT is so much more than a chatbot function and can help your business in a large number of ways…

Creating content

ChatGPT can help create a range of content for your business, including blogposts, emails and social media posts. It will reduce the time taken to create this content and can also ensure consistency of your message.

Use very specific and clear prompts to get the best results for your content. You can also use ChatGPT for keyword research to help improve SEO.

While it can literally write content for you, you can also use it to speed up the brainstorming and content creation process – with staff then writing the material themselves.

If you do let ChatGPT do all the work for you, make sure to check it and edit it before publishing! Remember that ChatGPT gets its information from the internet, so it is important to make sure it isn’t too similar to the source material or you risk having a negative impact on your search engine rankings.

Customer support

ChatGPT provides a reliable chatbot service on your website 24/7. The flow of conversation feels more human and the responses to questions more natural than with most chatbots providing customer support on websites.

The quality of its response will depend on the prompt it is given. You can give it additional details, such as changing the tone or style or even inserting jokes and making the conversational style humorous.

Admin assistant

ChatGPT can take over routine administration processes, like data entry and email management – reducing staff time and costs.

Writing emails

ChatGPT can take over the time-consuming and often boring process of writing emails. Give ChatGPT the right information to create original email templates, including welcome emails, special offers and solutions to problems customers may face.

Add information about the customer or potential customer and the app can create a personalised email, complete with a call-to-action (CTA).

Time management

Not sure how best to organise your day? Give ChatGPT information on what you need to do in a day and it can create a daily schedule to maximise the use of your time and help you organise and prioritise tasks.

Creating presentations

Creating presentations is often time consuming and repetitive. But ChatGPT can take the pressure off. By feeding it the right information, the app can create high-quality presentations quickly and easily, freeing up your time to devote to more lucrative areas of the business.

Generating reports

Organising, reviewing and analysing data to generate reports is a time-consuming process. But ChatGPT can streamline the process by analysing a large quantity of data (including from multiple sources) to turn it into reports or summaries, which provide valuable business insights.

Research and analysis

ChatGPT can be used to research and analyse a wide range of business-critical topics, including market trends and research into your competitors’ services and products.

While this will undoubtedly save time, it is important to check the information the app gives you, as it uses the internet as a source and can’t differentiate between real information and misinformation (or ‘fake news’) around a particular subject.

Translation

If your business is expanding into other parts of the world, it takes a lot of time and effort to translate a website, product information and marketing materials into another language. ChatGPT can take the pressure off with fast and accurate translations in just a few seconds.

It can also be used for important documents and partnership agreements, as well as to help conversation between colleagues located in different parts of the world.

Product descriptions

Coming up with your own unique product descriptions, particularly if you have a lot of similar products, can be repetitive and time consuming. Most likely, you will eventually run out of the right words to use! ChatGPT can help you generate effective and suitable product descriptions in a fraction of the time.

Sales pitches

Sales pitches are another area where it is easy to get lost and start to run out of the right words to use. Thinking about the tone, a suitable call-to-action and any jokes etc can be overwhelming.

While you probably won’t want ChatGPT to write the whole pitch for you, you can certainly use it to get started. Ask it different questions about your products and services and use the answers as the basis of your sales pitch.

ChatGPT can generate engaging and relevant content quickly and can assist with researching information. It can make a real difference to companies looking to improve their customer engagement and online business. For small businesses, it can help the budgets go further, taking over some of the work of team members.

It is so powerful that it has the potential to put jobs at risk in future, but a savvy business will always need staff to check the messages produced by ChatGPT before they go live.

ChatGPT isn’t human and it shouldn’t be used to replace them completely! It is important that businesses edit any information it produces before publishing, to ensure it is giving the right messages and using the right tone.

But used in the right way, ChatGPT is a valuable tool for businesses of all sizes and in many industries.

The rise of artificial intelligence in web design

Mon, 17 Apr 2023 12:05:20 GMT

In recent years, artificial intelligence (AI) has become a lot more prominent in web design – and it’s no surprise! AI has advantages for everyone involved in a website – from the designer to the brand to the website visitor or customer. It has become a critical part of web design, helping with everything from building and customisation of websites to the way users experience them.

AI is a branch of computer science which makes computers simulate human intelligence to perform certain tasks. Computers use machine learning and natural language processing to achieve this. With machine learning, AI systems can improve their performance without being given new instructions by a web developer. Instead, AI learns new behaviours from all the data it receives and its interactions with them.

In many cases, AI is so advanced that it can be difficult to distinguish between human and AI interactions.

Perhaps the best known form of AI is virtual assistants, like Apple’s Siri or Amazon’s Alexa. AI is also responsible for the chatbots on many websites, personalised product recommendations on sites like Amazon, viewing recommendations on services like Netflix and for matching drivers and passengers on Uber.

The cost of implementing AI on your website will depend on the tools and services you choose, as well as the scope and scale of your website and business.

Some AI tools are completely free, while others will require a significant investment. So what is AI used for and what can it do for your business?

Personalising the online experience

Offering a personalised online experience to uses would have felt like a dream only a few years ago, but thanks to AI, it is becoming accessible and affordable to far more businesses.

Social media platforms use AI to personalise user feeds with content and adverts which should interest them, based on their online behaviour. And smaller organisations, including ecommerce businesses, can do the same. AI means businesses can:

Add an unlimited number of unique preferences and attributes
Easily customise their website based on user preferences

This happens automatically, without the intervention of a web developer, quickly and accurately offering a user exactly what they are looking for. So they see products and services which are more likely to be of interest to them, rather than just a general selection of your products.
AI dynamically delivers the right content to users at the right time, based on their real-time behaviour. Customised websites:

Generate more leads than other websites
Give a better user experience (UX)
Can classify different types of buyer persona based on their online behaviour
Are a useful tool for upselling and retargeting

Improved analytics

Analytics are an essential part of web design and AI offers some real advantages for analytics.

Can handle a huge amount of data
Quicker and more accurate results for analytics
Can use deep learning to identify patterns
More accessible even for smaller businesses

Automate tedious tasks

AI can be very useful in doing time-consuming, straightforward and tedious tasks for you, freeing up time for you to focus on important areas of the business, like growing the business or increasing sales. It will also reduce the costs involved in having staff carry out routine tasks.

Using AI to automate tasks in web design will help speed up the process and reduce the chances of errors or delays.

Tasks it can perform include data collection and analysis, including browsing behaviour and search history. This information can then be used to better understand important site metrics, such as user behaviour and site performance.

Improving conversions

AI can help improve conversions by analysing data to identify areas for improvement, providing insights which can be used to optimise the website for conversion.

In the past, businesses may have spent a lot of time on A/B testing to optimise their websites. This is a task which AI can now carry out – testing different variations of website elements to see which performs best, with minimal input from the website owner or developer.

AI can help with A/B testing in the following ways:

Delivering real-time statistics
Minimal outages due to the nature of AI
Saving considerable time and resources
Highly accurate and easy to adjust for other applications

Chatbots

Chatbots are perhaps the most powerful and recognisable innovation which AI has brought to us. Once a luxury used by only the biggest businesses, they are now very widely used on the websites of a huge range of businesses.
Chatbots act as customer service agents, engaging with visitors and answering queries about services or products 24/7. They are often just as helpful as real people, far more cost-effective and always available.

Conversations with chatbots may have felt frustrating and a little robotic in the past, but AI has moved on. Machine learning and natural language processing has allowed chatbots to improve their communication with website users over time, making them increasingly helpful to users.

Conversation with chatbots now feels far more authentic.
Chatbots don’t just save time and money with answering queries, they have also helped businesses make a shift towards more customer-focused websites, which prioritise bringing customers in and meeting their needs over getting their own messages out.

Over the last few years, the role of AI in web design has been huge. Its prominence has created business opportunities that just wouldn’t have existed without it. Companies like Uber have built their entire business based on AI, with their machine learning algorithm able to predict demand, helping drivers to maximise their income.

But it’s not just big companies which benefit from AI. Much smaller companies are using AI every day to gather insights into customer behaviour, learn from them and improve their operations to beat the competition.

By making it easier to develop and test pages, as well as improve the user experience, personalise offers and collect valuable data, it is no wonder AI has had such a rise in prominence in recent years. While it is unlikely AI will take over completely from human intelligence in web design and development, it is a valuable addition which looks set to stay.

Mistakes to avoid for B2B service providers

Fri, 03 Feb 2023 10:20:59 GMT

As a business owner, it is easy to make mistakes. There are so many demands on your time and so many conflicting priorities, that even the most experienced businessperson will sometimes do the wrong thing.

But, as a B2B service provider, it is essential that you stay competitive and there are lots of mistakes you can easily avoid, as long as you stay focused. These are the mistakes which are holding your business back and preventing you from growing as much as you would like to.

Recommendations and crossed fingers

Recommendations are a good way to win new business, but they’re not good enough to really grow your business. And hope or crossed fingers are even less effective!

To win new work and grow your business, you need to have a strategy in place. Your strategy should set out how you are going to reach your target audience. It should ensure you are the perfect fit for your perfect client – the customer which is looking for exactly what you have to offer.

Growing your fixed costs

It’s inevitable that as your client base grows, so too will your costs. You need new staff and new resources to ensure you can deliver for your customers. But there should be economies of scale in growing your client base.

The rate at which your fixed costs grow needs to be slower than the rate at which you acquire new clients and earn new income grows – otherwise you will be working harder, but not actually making any more money.

Not setting standards for your team

You want the service you provide to your clients to be of a high standard – higher than the standard of your competitors. To make this work, you need to set these standards for the whole team (including any freelancers or outside agencies working on your behalf) to follow.

Otherwise, your clients can end up with a patchy and unpredictable service, depending on which member of your team is working for them at a particular time. If the service is inconsistent, you can be sure they will look for another business to fulfil their requirements.

Working in, not on your business

When you start out in business, inevitably you have to do everything. It is stressful and tiring and can become completely overwhelming, meaning you lose sight of your targets and aims.

As your business grows, it is important to step back. Hire the right people with the right skills and delegate tasks to people whose skills in a particular area are almost certainly better than your own!

That frees up your time to focus on the bigger picture of how to grow your business and work for your dream clients, supporting them with the very best services you can provide.

Advertising for the sake of it

Advertising is good. Advertising without a proper strategy is a waste of time and money.

Your business should have a proper funnel strategy – targeting high value offers to the right businesses at the right time.

Your ads should appear on a number of channels which your dream clients are known to use and ensure that all leads are captured, connecting you with the very best clients.

Ineffective delegation

Delegating tasks is a big step in the right direction for a growing business.
But delegating without having a clear system of leadership which gives you the time and space to strategise, delegate and automate can be detrimental for any business, including a B2B service provider.

Effective delegation is about differentiating between the tasks you need to do yourself and the tasks you can pass on to your team (and making sure the team members have the right skills and experience for their allocated tasks).

Service delivery chaos

If you are working 60 to 80 hours a week for your business to just stand still, it is likely there is a problem with your systems.

If you don’t have clear system in place, which you can use any time you need to acquire a new client or deliver a productised service, you waste a huge amount of time, which can lead to stress, as well as a loss of focus on other important areas of your business.

Having no KPIs

It’s easy to fool yourself that your business is a success if you have no way to measure it.

Key performance indicators (KPIs) are the numbers that show you the return on your expenditure – have you picked up the right number of high value clients for the money you spend on staffing, advertising and other resources? Or are you spending a lot of money for very little return?

Check your business performance against KPIs regularly to ensure your company is heading in the right direction.

Getting involved in everything

It’s hard to let go and step back from a business you’ve created. But you’re not the best person for every job and you shouldn’t be doing every job.

It is impossible to scale and grow your business and provide the best possible service to your dream clients if you feel you have to have 100% control over everything.

Instead, you should focus on building a reliable, trusted and secure structure to help you let go of particular projects or aspects of the business, to allow other experienced team members to carry out the work to a high standard.

Spending too long in meetings

If you are spending six to eight hours in meetings every day, how are you ever able to do the actual work?

Meetings are tiring, making you less productive. And the longer they are, often the less focused they become.

Make it a priority to reduce the number of meetings to bare necessities and work to keep your team members and clients focused on a clear agenda, with only effective and relevant communication when in meetings.

Static team structures

People are your most valuable resource because they bring in the skills your clients need. But the skills clients need change over time. And the days where a team consisted of the same group of full-time staff members all working in the same office are long gone.

Sometimes you will need more staff for a short-term project, so it is important to have the flexibility to work with freelancers, part-timers and staff on fixed-term contracts. That way, you aren’t paying the salaries of staff who suddenly have very little do, because a big contract or project has come to an end.

Remote working means your team members can literally be working anywhere in the world, so you really can get the best people for a project – not just the best people living in the same town.

Not monitoring team members’ hours

By failing to monitor the billable hours your team members have worked, you could end up paying them for work which hasn’t been done.

Monitoring hours worked shouldn’t be a distraction from the main focus of the business, as there are ways to monitor what you do with work hours which are easy to set up and can be automated.

Not getting commitment from service providers

You run a B2B service provider yourself, but you almost certainly rely on services from others too – from lawyers to accountants and even office cleaners.

Just as you make a commitment to your own clients, it is important to get a clear commitment from your service providers too – for a set number of hours a month or a response within a certain timeframe, for example. Without that, you are left with uncertainty (and time wasted chasing the service provider), which detracts from the work you are doing for your clients and can even prevent you from delivering a service on time.

Accepting low profits

If your profits are less than 15% before tax and interest (EBIT), you are never more than a few sales away from having to lay off staff or even going out of business.

Check your company’s profitability regularly and take action to make any adjustments to move past a tolerance for low profit margins. You may need to improve the quality of your services to justify increasing your prices to ensure your business is more profitable in the future.

Selling services individually

Selling every service you provide individually is a big problem for a B2B service provider. It means you need to put far more time and energy into every sale than is necessary and you risk failing to meet client requirements.

Instead, work on understanding a client’s needs and focus on creating a productised service which will meet the needs of that client and many other similar clients.

Selling the same services as your competitors

When it comes to attracting and retaining clients, your business needs a USP.

But when you are selling services to other businesses, it is all too easy copy your seemingly successful competitors and sell the same services they are selling. Don’t be tempted to lower your standards and your prices and jump on the same bandwagon as everyone else.

Avoid this mistake by clearly defining the solutions you provide for client problems. Even if you don’t invent a brand new solution, but you doadd value to an existing one, make sure you highlight that to clients and prospective clients.

Not knowing where the next client is coming from

If you’re never sure where your next client is going to come from, you need to ask yourself questions about your business model.

An effective revenue-generating business strategy is based on specifically knowing who your target clients are, where they are, what their problems are and how you can solve them.

A targeted sales funnel, focused on advertising the right products in the right places for your dream clients, will help you to reach them and keep a steady flow of new clients who want to buy your services.

Trying to retain staff and clients at any cost

Retaining talented staff is tough in today’s competitive market. Retaining valued clients is tough too. But that doesn’t mean you should acquire and keep every client and every talented team member out there, whatever the cost.

Identify your ideal matches (for both clients and employees) and put a figure on their value to you. However good they appear on paper, if they are costing more than they are bringing in and don’t maximise your return on investment, they aren’t the right people for you.

Focus instead on finding those clients and team members who really are a perfect fit for your business.

Sales pitches aimed at you rather than the client

B2B clients are drawn to service providers that spell out loud and clear what’s in it for them.

Make sure your pitch is speaking the client’s language and that everything is geared towards what they will get, rather than what you will do.

When pitching, either face-to-face or online, avoid using language like “we do” and “we are” and instead focus on “you get”.

Most B2B service providers will have made some, if not all, of these mistakes in the past. But the good news is that, while the mistakes are easy to make, they are also easy to put right.

It only takes a small shift in priorities, and even in the language yo u use, to make your business and your services more appealing to clients and potential clients - and ultimately increase your sales.

Why your B2B company should be using service productisation

Fri, 13 Jan 2023 12:04:04 GMT

Service productisation is a business strategy which helps you meet the needs of your clients and grow your business over time. It is especially important for a business to business (B2B) company.

Productisation of services does not mean selling products. It means selling clearly defined services in a similar way to how you might sell products – your services have the same price, scope and quality every time.

With productisation, your customers will instantly know what they are getting when they see your offer and won’t need to ask lots of questions or hold a series of meetings to define service parameters.

Service productisation can help your business stand out from your competitors. When someone visits multiple websites and finds the one with well-defined productised offers, they know that this is the business which will solve the specific problem they struggle with.

Benefits of service productisation

Service productisation will benefit your B2B business in the following ways:

Lowers the cost of generating new offers every time you meet a potential new customer
Raises your sales confidence levels
Gets rid of indecisive clients who spend time on meetings without the intention to buy
Maximises the value of repetitive services, which you can sell over and over again
Increases customer lifetime value (CLV)
Decreases customer acquisition cost (CAC)

To begin a service productisation business, you need to understand the differences between services and products, and how to effectively transform a service into a product.

Service as a product is a business model in which a company gives services the characteristics of a product.

If you want to turn a service into a product, you need to transform its service characteristics into product characteristics.

By productising services, you are giving greater value to the customer, by emphasising the hidden value of each service.

It isn’t easy to turn a service into a product and the process presents a number of challenges. But it is worth putting in the time and effort. By streamlining and systemising your operations, the solutions you provide are easy for you and, most importantly, are so beneficial for your clients that they come back to you and become repeat customers.

Productisation of your services will:

Mean your automated sales funnel will run independently of your involvement
Create a work environment with focus, clarity and independence
Bring in new high-quality leads which are really interested in your service
Allow a business owner/ manager to oversee work instead of doing hands-on work

Productised consulting services

A productised consulting business offers pre-defined consulting services to a target audience, rather than providing a customised solution for every client. The key benefits of working with productised consulting services are:

Transparency - Specified consulting packages with descriptive service scope and parameters productise consulting services, meaning clients know from the outset what to expect from a business. This way, there can be no question that they are being overcharged or given services they don’t need.
Trust – Thanks to the transparency offered by a productised business, a company feels it can trust the business and is happy to go back for repeat business.
Reduced negotiation time – Having a clear productised offer from the start means you spend less time negotiating a contract, freeing up time to be as clear as possible about your best productised offers.
No endless tweaks – When you create a customised proposal for a client, it can feel like a never-ending cycle of tweaks and adjustments, as you send draft after draft back to them for approval. Productising consulting services doesn’t mean you can’t make improvements. But it means you can make the right improvement for the right price, at the right time and for the right client.
Streamlined work processes – With productised offers, it is easy to streamline and even automate your processes to follow defined quality standards.

Productised services mean you spend a lot less time chasing clients. Instead, you will attract clients for whom you can help grow their sales (and they will help you grow your sales too), while you productise the services which will be most valuable to clients.

The key to service productisation is through standardisation of your offer. By adding automation to the standardised features and qualities of your services, you can optimise and scale up your business.

And the good news is, every service industry can be productised.

Every productised service starts with a good idea, but the most important thing is knowing how to productise your service (the expertise and skills you have to offer other businesses) in a way that provides maximum value to your clients.

Once you have done this, you have started a productised service business which can run and grow by itself, making it easier for you to continue to run and grow your business.

How to productise your service

Turning your productised service ideas into practical steps and implementing them isn’t easy. But it is worth investing the time and effort to get it right.
These questions can help you create a framework to do the work:

• What problems are my target audience trying to solve? - Ask current customers or do online research to connect your skills to potential new clients, which you have the skills and expertise to help. And if you’re lacking expertise in some areas, hire new team members to fill the gaps.
• What is the goal of my dream client? – A solution to a problem should always be related to a goal your dream client wants to achieve.

• How to transform their problem into a solution? - Having clear, defined parameters will help turn your expertise into a solution to your client’s problem (and from there to the problems of many similar future clients). Again, recruit new staff members if needed or make sure the task is allocated to the best possible member of your team to ensure you are providing real value to your client.

• Does this solution really work? – To find out if your productised solution really works, you need to test it on at least three clients who are already happy with the service you provide and get their feedback. The initial offer needs to be risk-free for both you and your client, which means it needs to pay for itself and provide fast and effective action for your customer.

• Can I keep solving problems for my clients? – Solutions won’t stay solutions forever and new problems will arise. A productised service doesn’t mean never making changes to your offer, it just means not making changes for every single client, every single time. Track results from your initial solution and see where you can make changes and improvements over time to grow your productised service business.

Service productisation framework

A service productisation framework helps your business to break the cycle of more clients leading to higher costs and more stress. It prevents the value of what you have to offer getting lost in layers of complexity.

Instead, it helps you to identify and package that value in a way that works for yourself and your clients, without repeating past mistakes.

Running a productised service business adds value for clients and boosts customer lifetime value (CLV) – making you a reliable and trustworthy partner, leading to increased sales.

Examples of three productised offers which will help you productise any service business, regardless of its complexity are:

No-brainer offer

This is a great starting point, an entry level productised offer to get started for your own business and your clients.

A no-brainer offer:

Shows clients and potential clients what makes your business different from the competition
Is low risk for yourself and your client
Pays for itself
Gets the client’s problem solved quickly and easily
Establishes trust, thanks to the result you have achieved

Solution productised offer

The no-brainer offer does the initial legwork, then you can move on to the solution productised offer.

This is where you implement the key solution, which solves the client’s main problem, related to the high-complexity processes requested by the client. The solution productised offer adds new value with clear features and processes, which follow on from the early results you achieved with the no-brainer offer.

Maximisation offer

If a client has bought a working productised solution from you, this can become a maximised offer by implementing a KPI monitoring system and giving suggestions for improvements, based on the tracked results.

Using this three-offer system, your business can:

Build a repeatable process
Add value for your clients month by month
Develop long-term client relationships
Reuse the same process for future clients, reducing your own costs over time

It’s not easy to get started with running a productised service business, and it may initially involve some thinking outside the box. But, once you have it up and running, it will really make a difference to the bottom line of your B2B business, as well as making processes smoother, clearer and more effective.

Once you have your productised offers ready, running a productised service business can be done almost on autopilot. The key things to remember are:

Define your client’s problems and identify their goals.
Create a solution to their problem (which should ideally be a problem for other businesses, so you can sell your solution to more potential clients).
Validate your offer by finding three to five clients who can check that your solution lives up to the quality standards required of their business.

Apps we can add to your website

Thu, 08 Dec 2022 13:03:24 GMT

Want your website to do even more for your business? There is a huge range of apps we can add to your site to help it perform even better for you and your customers.

With the addition of these apps, there really is nothing your website won’t be able to do!

Here is the full list of apps we can add to your website…

Using Facebook Ads for B2B businesses

Fri, 02 Dec 2022 13:02:32 GMT

Advertising on Facebook is just for business to consumer (B2C) companies, right? Wrong!

Owners of business to business (B2B) companies may assume that advertising on Facebook is only for B2C companies, but the world’s biggest social media site also reaches business owners and decision-makers.

So to ignore, its potential is to miss a trick.

Facebook is a key advertising channel for many small businesses. With nearly three billion monthly active users , advertising on Facebook gives your company the ability to reach lots of potential customers, with a relatively small advertising budget.

Facebook Ads are great for promoting products and services, but they don’t deliver immediate sales for B2B businesses. Instead, they generate leads, which can be nurtured to ultimately convert into sales.

Facebook Ads need to work a bit harder than other advertising platforms, as people aren’t generally on Facebook searching for the answers to a problem or researching a product or service. But, like the rest of us, business owners spend their downtime on social media. And a well-timed, well-placed B2B advert on Facebook can catch their attention as they scroll mindlessly. They won’t want to see an irrelevant ad, but it is possible to target Facebook Ads very specifically to reach the right people in business.

With Facebook Ads, a B2B business has the option to select quality over quantity with the audience it reaches. This is perfect for smaller brands which don’t have the budgets of household names and need to only target those who are likely to part with their cash.

Just as with B2C advertising, the buyer’s journey is an essential part of a B2B Facebook advertising campaign. Without taking into account the buyer’s journey – Awareness, Consideration, Decision – any advertising campaign, whether B2B or B2C will be destined to fail.

Facebook Ads Manager

Facebook Ads Manager is where you create your ads. It is used to buy advertising placements across Facebook and Instagram.

Opening Facebook Ads Manager for the first time can feel overwhelming! You will find multiple reporting dashboards, ad format options and audience insight tools, which can all initially make running an advertising campaign seem very complicated.

If you are ready to start advertising on Facebook for the first time, here’s how to open a Facebook Ads Manager account:

· If you haven’t got one already, create a Facebook business page. You will need to do this through a personal account, although you can change permissions once the Facebook business page has been created.

· Open your Facebook Business Manager account. Under Accounts, select Ad Accounts.

· Select Create a New Ad Account.

· Name your account, then set your time zone and choose your currency.

· You can invite your team to use your new ad account too, giving them either partial permission or full control.

· Add the payment method you’ll use to pay for the ads.

The Facebook Ads Manager divides new campaigns into three tiers:

Campaigns - the overall objective for your campaign, such as conversions, website clicks or engagement. Choose a campaign name that reflects this goal.

Ad sets - select your target audience. You can create several ad sets per campaign and assign different budgets to each. If your overall goal is to drive conversions, for example, you might assign 60% of the campaign budget to those in the 35-44 age bracket and 40% to those in the 45-54 age bracket.

Ads - this is where you actually produce the ads your target audience will see. You can have several ads per ad set.

The Facebook (or Meta) pixel

If you use Facebook Ads, or plan to use them in the future, the Facebook pixel (or Meta pixel as it is now known) is a must-use tool.

The Facebook pixel is a piece of code that you place on your own website. It collects data to help you track conversions from Facebook Ads, optimise ads, build a targeted audience for future advertising campaigns and remarket to people who have already taken some kind of action on your website.

Facebook pixel data helps ensure your adverts are seen by the people who are most likely to take your desired action. This means you will improve your Facebook ad conversion rate and get a better return on your investment (ROI).

It works by placing and triggering cookies to track users as they interact with your business, both on and off Facebook and Instagram. The Facebook pixel allows you to see how people interact with your website after they have seen your Facebook ad.

You can even use the Meta pixel to record views of a specific category on your website, instead of tracking all views.

Even if you’re not using Facebook or Instagram ads yet, you should install the Facebook pixel as soon as possible. It will start collecting straightaway, so that you already have that essential information available when you’re ready to create your first Facebook ad .

Campaign objectives

A B2B business advertising on Facebook should focus on four campaign objectives:

· Brand awareness

· Traffic

· Lead generation

· Conversion

A B2B brand awareness campaign is the very top of your marketing funnel and focuses on marketing messages to build your name and your brand.

For brand awareness campaigns:

· Target a broad audience or demographic

· Target audiences with the characteristics of a potential B2B buyer/ decision-maker in your industry

· Target eight to 10% of your previous buyers and existing customers as a lookalike audience

A B2B traffic campaign will drive more visits to your website. For traffic campaigns:

· Study and evaluate specific demographics and industry profiles

· Assign specific products and services to buyer personas

B2B lead generation campaigns further define your target audience and discover potential buyers deeper into the marketing funnel. Lead ads enable B2B marketers to choose from a wide range of audience targeting options. Use appropriate data fields for audience targeting, such as job title, employer and industry.

A B2B conversion campaign aims to close a sale or achieve another specific action, such as a download or sign-up. This is usually where the buyer’s journey ends.

Make the most of your advertising spend by maximising the value of every click. It is recommended that your Facebook conversion campaigns are directed to a targeting landing page on your website to seal the deal.

Budget and scheduling

Facebook Ads can cost as much or as little as you want. You can get results from a fairly low spend, as long as it is targeted at the right audience at the right time.

When setting up your ads for a B2B audience, you can set either a daily or lifetime budget. Initially, most people will find it easier to deal with a daily budget.

You then need to assign a threshold for your ad spend, and schedule start and end dates for a campaign.

Facebook will optimise the use of your budget within your timeframe and against your selected advertising campaign objectives (brand awareness, traffic, lead generation or conversion). However, you can choose to schedule your ads to run at a time that you consider to be more cost-effective. Most people will want to avoid evenings or weekends, but if you know that your target audience spends time on social media unwinding in the evenings, that might be the best time for you!

Ad placement

Facebook ads can appear in different places on the site:

· Facebook Newsfeed

· Facebook Groups

· The right column of Facebook Pages

· Instant Articles

· Videos

Unless you tell it otherwise, your ads could appear anywhere on Facebook. Not all of these placements will be very visible to your audience.

When opting for the right placements, you need to strike a balance between noticeable and intrusive. While the Newsfeed will make ads harder to miss, it may also appear to be intrusive, if someone is just checking their feed to catch up with friends.

Generally however, the Newsfeed and right column are the best place for your B2B ads.

You can also specify whether ads should appear on all devices, desktop only or mobile only.

Audience

For your B2B ads to be effective, they have to reach the right audience. The good news is, Facebook is very good at targeting specific audiences with its ads.

Unlike Google Ads, which is based on keywords and searches, Facebook is audience based. You can use multiple distinguishing factors to create your ideal customer, target audience or buyer persona.

Facebook B2B audiences are targeted as:

· Core audience

· Custom audience

· Lookalike audience

For the core audience, you will define broad audience characteristics, such as location, age and gender. You can also add other demographics here, such as education, ethnicity, life events and political affiliation.

The custom audience is particularly good for businesses which already have a decent amount of traffic on their websites. It allows you to select the audience most likely to convert into paying clients. It has four targeting options:

· Website custom audience – matches visits to your website with Facebook profiles, allowing you to reach people who have already visited your business website

· App activity custom audience – works in a similar way to the website customer audience, but for visitors to your app, if you have one

· Customer list custom audience – uses client data that you will need to upload. Facebook then matches the list with their accounts

· Engagement custom audience – allows you to reach people who have engaged with your posts or performed an action such as following a page or watching a video

The lookalike audience option allows you to create a custom audience list based on user data tracked by the Facebook (Meta) pixel, mobile app or Facebook page fans and subscribers.

Facebook Ads uses this information to display your ads to people who have similar characteristics to this audience.

Using a lookalike audience means targeting a smaller audience with a higher rate of similarity, compared to the core audience, which is a larger audience and more diverse.

While it might be a good idea to test the waters with all of the different forms of audience, the likelihood is that a lookalike audience will be more effective for a B2B business, even though the ads will reach less people.

While decision-makers in your target audience won’t usually be on Facebook looking for the answers to their business’s problems, Facebook’s targeting options means you can still interrupt their scrolling with a well-timed and well-placed ad.

Facebook might not be top of the agenda for B2B advertising, but by using its sophisticated targeting tools, it can still achieve results and be highly cost-effective.

How sales automation can help your business

Mon, 14 Nov 2022 12:23:30 GMT

In 2023, if you are still inputting contacts by hand or manually typing out emails to customers or prospects, you are wasting valuable time.

Sales automation is mechanisation of routine and time-consuming sales tasks, using software, artificial intelligence (AI) and other digital tools, and it can really make a difference to your business.

Sales automation of routine tasks can make routine tasks much easier and free up time to concentrate on connecting with customers, closing sales and growing your business. It also ensures the sales process is streamlined and uniform across the business, rather than having different team members doing things in different ways.

Using sales automation means your business will no longer:

• Lose a deal because somebody forgot to follow it up
• Waste precious time adding leads or opportunities to your CRM
• Call leads in alphabetical order rather than prioritising those who are most likely to buy
• Waste time trying to organise meetings
• Waste time searching through files for a specific piece of information

Sales automation has a number of benefits for your business, and especially for the bottom line. It can:

· Increase performance and productivity of your sales team

· Improve the accuracy of your sales process

· Prevent sales leads from getting missed or forgotten

· Speed up your sales process

· Help recognise potential customers

· Streamline sales tasks across the business

· Improve consistency of data

· Speed up response times and increase customer satisfaction

Yet, despite this, around 50% of sales teams’ time is spent on tasks that could be automated, according to Forbes.

So why are some managers still reluctant to use sales automation? There can be fear that it will make the sales process too impersonal and take away the connection with customers. But in fact, the reverse is true. Using automation for routine administrative tasks frees up time for your sales team to spend more time on personal connections and nurturing relationships with customers.

If you are concerned about the cost, automating your sales process isn’t expensive or complicated and should be well within the reach of small businesses.

Automating the sales process

There are four basic stages in automating the sales process, which should be very recognisable to sales teams, as they are the same as any other sales process.

The four stages are:

· Awareness

· Interest

· Decision

· Action

Awareness is when a potential customer stumbles across your company for the first time. They might find you through a Google search, on social media or through a paid advert. They know nothing about your business yet, but it is likely they will be interested in the sort of products or services you have to offer.

At this stage, your automated sales system could offer them some short-term special offers to get them more interested in your business.

When a lead takes an interest in your products or services, it is time to move onto the next step. To get to this stage, they will have had some form of contact with your company, such as signing up for your emails or getting in touch about a price through your website.

Now your automated sales system will keep their interest through a series of welcome emails giving them more information about the benefits of your products or services, perhaps through videos, whitepapers or blog content.

You can use automation for reminders to your sales team to follow up if a prospect clicks on a link in an email.

As a prospect is close to reaching a decision , sales automation can be used to share detailed information on products, as well as confidential information like contracts or invoices.

Once a prospect has taken action and bought your product or service, automation can deal with handling the payment and sorting out shipping, without a sales rep having to input customer information into a database.

The sales automation software can also keep track of which customers have received their products, which still need to make payments and which products are still to be despatched.

All of this will free up the sales team’s time for nurturing new and existing leads, working towards increasing sales and repeat business.

What can sales automation do?

Sales automation can take over a number of tasks which are usually carried out by sales teams. At the heart of your sales automation is your customer relationship management (CRM) tool.

With your CRM you can organise, track and nurture leads and customers. Key tasks include emails, lead prioritisation, scheduling meetings and generating reports.

Email

Sales reps often spend a considerable amount of time writing and sending emails. Automating emails can free up time to concentrate on other tasks.

There are a lot of common emails which sales teams send out, including welcome emails, reminder/ follow-up emails and thank you emails. These can all be automated, using email templates. It is possible to use personalisation tools with automation, so that they, for example, say ‘Hi John’ rather than just ‘Hi’.

You can also use automation to track which emails are clicked and opened, to see if there is any sort of email which works particularly well or particularly badly, helping you to improve future email campaigns.

Lead prioritisation

At the start of the sales process, you will have a lot of leads. Most of them won’t go on to buy or convert.

Automation can help you prioritise leads, so that you can focus on those which are more likely to become customers. Automated lead scoring tools work on AI. To set them up, you need to create a model of the ideal customer, which will enable the tool to score and prioritise leads.

This will help save time wasted on sales reps trying to nurture leads that aren’t interested in your products or services and never will be.

Lead enrichment

Lead enrichment helps you build a relationship with a prospective customer by creating a picture of them. Automated lead enrichment can gather information from several sources, so that you know things like what company your lead works for, what industry they are in and what their social media presence is.

Having this information at your fingertips will show a prospective customer that you’ve done your research and understand them. This will help to create a good impression, which in turn will help to close a deal.

Lead distribution

Making contact with a lead too late can put them off your company and mean you lose out on a potential sale. Automated lead distribution will make sure that not only are leads not lost in the system, but they are assigned to the best sales rep.

With the right software, you can assign leads to a team member who has the capacity to deal with them promptly, who is an expert in the right industry or knows the lead’s geographical location. This way, sales reps can contact prospects more quickly than they would if you were relying on manual systems.

Forecasting

Sales automation can use past sales and seasonal trends to predict future sales growth. This will save a huge amount of staff time which could otherwise be spent looking for documents and spreadsheets and trying to collate the information into a format which is useful and relevant.

Proposals

When drafting a proposal or quote, the relevant details like the customer’s name and contact details will be transferred over from your CRM system. If the contacts don’t sign and return the proposal promptly, you can set up automated reminders.

If someone internally, like a manager or someone from the finance or legal team, needs to review a proposal before it is sent to a prospect, you can set up an internal workflow in the automation system so the right person can see it before it goes out.

Live chat

Chatbots on a website are one of the best uses of AI in sales. They allow visitors to ask questions and get an instant answer, cutting time spent on the phone or email for both the prospect and the sales team. Chatbots can also gather useful contact details and even process payments.

Their use of language can be personalised to your company and definitely doesn’t need to sound like a robot!

Generating reports

Sales managers spend a lot of time generating reports to keep the team updated on progress in the sales pipeline – where deals are up to, which deals have closed, how much income has been generated etc.

Putting these reports together involves a lot of manual data entry, which is both time-consuming and runs a real risk of error. It only takes one badly typed number for all the figures to be completely inaccurate.
Automating report generation will make life easier for sales managers and ensure the team all have access to accurate and timely reports.

All of these tasks can help save a lot of time and create seamless processes for your team and, most importantly, your customers. But it’s important to remember that you can’t automate absolutely everything.

Human interaction will always play a very important role in the sales process, and it is important that customers do get to talk to a real person. Sales automation can’t replace the warmth of genuine human interaction. It simply replaces a real person in those situations where automation can do the task just as well (or often better and quicker).

With sales automation on your side, you can get the best of both worlds and the results for your bottom line should speak for themselves.

The benefits of email automation workflows

Fri, 14 Oct 2022 11:44:26 GMT

If you are spending a lot of time emailing customers and seeing very little in return, there is an easier way. Email automation workflows.

But what are email automation workflows? They are automated emails which are sent to help nurture leads into customers. Once they are up and running, they require very little work on your part, yet they can make a huge difference to your sales. If you sell online, you should be using email automation workflows.

Here’s why…

Automatic and don’t require intervention

One of the biggest benefits of email workflows is that they work all on their own. Once you have set them up, you can choose specific criteria to trigger the workflows, then the emails will send out automatically.

You don't need someone sat a desk ready to click send. You can rely on the email automation to work around the clock, seven days a week, whenever you need it to.

Increase brand awareness

Automated emails are generally more consistent and professional-looking than if you have various team members sending out emails.

You know what happens when more people get involved – more typos, more inconsistent messages and more forgetting your house style! Email automation makes a business appear far better organised and more responsive than this.

When a lead receives helpful and relevant emails from your business at the right time, it will give them a greater awareness and understanding of your brand.

So when a salesperson gets in touch with them, they will already know what your business is about and are more likely to be interested in what you have to offer.

Carefully planned email strategy

While some companies just send the occasional email to their contact database, email workflows are carefully planned, with the goal of building relationships and increasing sales.

With every email you send through an email automation workflow, you have the opportunity to plan out how it will work. By ensuring each email is relevant and has a purpose, you will increase your chances of nurturing your leads and ultimately turning them into customers.

Nurture leads

If your salespeople get in touch with a prospect too early, it can be enough to turn that prospect away. Just because someone has signed up for further information or downloaded a free how-to guide from your website, it doesn’t mean they are ready to talk to a salesperson.

A well-timed email can bridge that gap and help keep a person’s interest in your brand.

Email workflows nurture a lead by following up on their interest with helpful information and resources. If the emails are relevant and engaging, a prospective customer will learn more about your business and products, and be more receptive when they are approached by your sales team in the future.

Help your sales team

Email workflows designed to nurture potential customers are a great help to your sales team. They can see which emails and content a lead has engaged with – and which they haven’t been interested in.

Using this information when they contact a lead, your salespeople can focus on the particular products or services that person has shown interest in. With the help of the email workflows, there is a higher chance a prospect will be interested in what your business has to offer.

Some email workflow tools will even alert your sales team when a prospect has taken a particular action, meaning they would be likely to take the next step if contacted by the sales team.

Cost effective

Email automation workflows are highly cost effective. With the automated emails doing the work of contacting and nurturing leads, you don't need a large sales team making calls every day.

A smaller team can approach leads after the emails have put in the heavy lifting! Automated emails also save the cost of staff time in writing and sending out emails regularly.

And as marketing automation is so easy to use, less experienced members of staff can manage the workflows for your business.

Relevant to the recipient

When you plan your automated email workflows, you can make ensure they are completely relevant and of interest to the recipient.

If a prospect receives emails which aren’t tailored, they will soon become annoyed with your brand, stop opening the emails and hit unsubscribe.

By making sure your email workflows are relevant to the recipient, you can get more people on board with your brand and what you have to offer.

Better personalisation

A prospect is always going to respond better to a personalised email, rather than a blanket one sent to hundreds of other people. A personal touch will increase open rates and click-throughs of your emails.

When an email is automatically sent through personalised email workflows, it will have personalisation tokens that are filled with the contact's information. That way, instead of saying, 'Hi, there,' the email will say, 'Hi, Andy.'

Many email workflow tools can also add other personal information, including location, the company a contact works for and much more. The more personalised information you can include in an email, the better it will be at strengthening the relationship between a prospect and your business.

Better targeting

One of the most effective ways to use automation is to segment email contacts into different groups or lists based on their attributes (such as gender, age, profession and geographical location) and behaviour patterns. This essential information can all be stored in your CRM.

By dividing your main subscriber list into smaller lists, you can send more targeted emails to your contacts. Targeted emails increase engagement rates, conversions and customer satisfaction. And a satisfied customer is more likely to become a repeat customer!

You can also target prospects using advanced workflows like lead scoring, which allows you to gauge interest and purchase potential for different leads. This allows you to target leads with a relevant follow-up message for them, which will encourage them to convert – or convert for a second, third or 10th time.

Boost sales

Ultimately, all businesses want to increase their sales. And using email automation workflows to implement a successful lead nurturing system can make a big difference to your conversion rates.

Targeted communications will increase the probability that a lead will convert. Even if the conversion rate is increased by a small percentage, it will have a really positive effect on overall sales figures.

Less mistakes

If you currently have one person writing and sending emails to new leads, then there’s a good chance mistakes will happen. And if you’ve got several people writing them, the chance of errors is even higher – from duplication to mixed messages. Getting somebody’s name wrong is the biggest mistake you can make, yet it happens surprisingly often when companies don’t use an automated system.

Making spelling mistakes or hitting send too early may mean the email recipient has less trust in your company, particularly if it happens more than once. Errors show a lack of interest and attention to detail, which paint your business in a bad light. With email workflows, emails can be thoroughly proofed and checked over before they go live.

Time saving

If a staff member is sending out emails to prospects, it can be practically a full-time job in itself! When everything is automated, it saves a lot of time. The software will handle repetitive tasks that would be time-consuming for a team member to complete by hand.

While the email workflows work, the team is free to focus on other important areas of running and growing your business. The emails will nurture the leads and contacts, while you are working on other jobs, ready to approach the leads when the time is right.

Understand your customers better

Understanding your customers is key to a successful business, but how do you find the time to do it when you are so busy? Email automation is an easy way to learn about and understand your customers.

Email automation workflows will show you what your customers tend to click on, the sort of pages they visit most frequently and the types of content they are interested in.

This information can help you to target your marketing even more effectively to reach your ideal customers and increase sales.

Keep existing customers on board

Marketing isn’t all about attracting new customers. In fact, targeting existing customers can be much more effective. According to research, attracting a new customer costs five times as much as keeping existing customers. And it costs 16 times more to bring a new customer to the spending level of your repeat customers.

In addition, the more often repeat customers convert, the higher their average spend compared to first-time customers. This is because repeat customers tend to make more purchases over time as they grow to trust your brand, making them valuable for business success.

Email automation supports customer retention and loyalty strategies. It allows a business to automate requests for feedback, send exclusive offers to high spending customers and trigger re-engagement campaigns if subscribers are straying.

These tactics strengthen your relationship with your existing customers and increase customer lifetime value.

Detailed reporting

Any decent marketing automation software will include a useful reporting function. This function makes your team more accountable, because you can see how your marketing activities support your sales pipeline.

Detailed reporting allows you to highlight any areas where results could be better, giving your team the tools to make changes to deliver even better results for your business.

Using email automation workflows is a really effective way to reach your target customers with the right messages at the right time, to increase your sales and grow your business.

With automated emails you can save time, save money and personalise your message. If you haven’t yet invested in automated emails for your business, now is the time to look into it. There are some really cost-effective options available, for businesses of all sizes and in all sectors.

If you are not sure where to start, Cotswold Web is a marketing agency in Cheltenham, and we can take the pressure off and support you in your marketing.

Creative web design ideas to increase your sales and conversion

Fri, 07 Oct 2022 10:13:26 GMT

Whether you are just starting out with a brand-new business or looking to update your website, the design needs to work to increase your sales and conversions.

If you don’t get the design right, potential customers will click away long before they’ve had a chance to explore your content.

On the flipside, you could have the most stunning website in the world, but if it’s not converting visitors into customers, there is no point! If your site has steady traffic, but low conversion, sadly that is generally a sign of poor design.

Web design isn't just about aesthetics; it's also about usability. A well-designed site can help customers find what they're looking for faster, while providing a better overall experience. If you want to improve your website conversions, be aware of its flaws, put your visitors ahead of your own preferences and start making changes.

Here’s our top web design ideas to increase your sales and conversions. You could do them yourself, but you could also work with a marketing agency with years of experience. Here at Cotswold Web, we offer web design services in Cheltenham, covering Gloucestershire, the Cotswolds and further afield, which could really make a difference to your sales and conversions.

Design for user experience (UX)

When designing a website, your users must come first. Which means designing for user experience (UX). Key UX considerations are whether your website is easy to use and pleasant to use.

If visitors have a good experience on your website, they are more likely to trust your brand and ultimately become customers.

Designing for UX isn’t easy for people with no web design experience, which is why we would always advise using a web design agency for your website.

Load speeds

If visitors are met with a slow site, they are going to leave before they’ve had chance to look at your products or services. Semrush advises a load speed of one to two seconds. Any longer, and your visitors start to get frustrated.

Importantly, load speeds also affect your ranking on Google. Slow load speeds mean UX isn’t as good as it should be, so search engines rank slow sites lower on a search engine results page (SERP).

White space

White space (sometimes known as negative space) is a design trend which has been around for a long time and it is here to stay.

White space (which can actually be any colour) is the empty space between your text, images and other elements of the page. Having this space on your website makes it much more readable and easier to understand.

When designing your website, make sure there is plenty of space between the header and content and between the paragraphs. This reduces distraction on the page, which in turn helps to improve conversions.

F Pattern

The F pattern is the way most of us read and digest information. We start at the top left corner, read along to the top right corner, then move down to the next line – rather like the letter F.

If your website design follows this principle, with the top left corner creating a particularly good impression, it will encourage conversions.

Rule of thirds

The rule of thirds is another way we take in and digest information. It is used to determine the best place on a page to share key information, as it is where the eye is naturally drawn to.

Imagine a page is divided into three both horizontally and vertically. The four squares in the centre of the page are the best place for important content like calls-to-action (CTAs).

Use the best images

A study by PR News found that online content with good images gets 94% more views than those without.
Good images act as storytellers. Visitors to your website will ‘read’ the images and, in a split second, make a decision whether or not the rest of your website content is relevant to them.

There are plenty of stock images out there, but most of them will have appeared on hundreds or thousands of other websites. In addition, they may not completely reflect your brand. If you can, take photos yourself or commission a photographer to do it for you. Taking care over your images shows you are serious about your brand, which helps potential customers to trust your business.

Here at Cotswold Web, we can advise on the images which will help your website to convert.

Typography/ fonts

One area where you don’t want to get too creative is your use of typography/ fonts.

People want to read a clean website that doesn’t hurt the eyes, so make sure your fonts don’t make it difficult for them!

Your font can and should match your branding. It shouldn’t be boring, but it should be easy on the eye and easy to read.

Landing pages

Your landing pages are where visitors end up when they click through from an ad or social media post. These visitors are interested in your brand and what you have to offer, so your landing pages need to maximise the chances of them converting. A landing page should really follow through on the promise in your ad or social media post. If it doesn’t deliver on what the visitor thought they would be getting, they won’t convert.

A landing page is focused on a single project or offer, with every element of the page geared towards your call-to-action (CTA). Avoid any unnecessary links, pop-ups or navigation options which could prove distracting or even encourage visitors to leave. On a landing page, there should be no chance of a visitor getting distracted and performing a different action.

For high ticket items, you could even consider separate landing pages for the same product, but for different audiences eg someone coming over to your site from LinkedIn will probably want to see something different from someone visiting from Instagram.

Effective CTAs

For a visitor to convert, your website and especially your landing pages need effective calls-to-action (CTAs).

You need to include CTAs throughout your site. A landing page should only have one CTA, to minimise distractions and increase the chance of conversion. An effective landing page may have the CTA appearing two or three times on the page, to ensure a visitor can’t miss it if they don’t scroll down far enough. There should always be sufficient white space around your CTA to make sure it stands out.

There is a lot of discussion about the right colour or the right wording for a CTA. The key for the colour is that it should stand out from the page, while not appearing completely at odds with your branding. Wording should be kept simple and direct – Buy now; Book a seat; Start a free trial.

Menus/ navigation

Your menus and navigation are another area where it’s best not to get too creative! Consumers are all pretty savvy with websites and know how to navigate them. They expect to find a menu in a particular place and to be able to navigate in a particular way. If a website does something different, that can be confusing and can be enough to make a visitor walk away.

Remember:

· Put menus in a familiar place

· Use familiar labels like ‘About’ and ‘Blog’

· Use colours for texts and backgrounds which are easy to read

· Make sure menus are small enough to fit on the page, but big enough to be legible and clickable on all devices

Social proof/ reviews

Social proof and reviews are an essential part of any website design.

They show that others have used your products or services and are happy with them. This helps the undecided visitor decide to take the plunge.

Reviews shouldn’t get in the way of your CTAs, but they should be easy to find. Many businesses have them running along the bottom of every page, so visitors don’t even have to search for them.

Mobile site

The mobile and desktop experience are different for visitors, so your mobile and desktop sites should be designed differently.

On a mobile site, less is more. There is no room for distractions, because they can completely obliterate your key message and the action you want your visitors to take.

You may use different CTAs on your mobile site. While the action or offer is the same, the button and the way to access it may be different, to allow for the much smaller screen size.

Designing for mobile is a particular skill and it would make sense to use a web design agency like Cotswold Web in Cheltenham. We have years of experience in knowing what works and what doesn’t!

Video

Video will bring your home page and landing pages to life. Used on more and more websites, it is no longer something which is expensive and reserved for only the biggest brands. In some sectors, the audience will expect to see video on a website.

A video can tell a brand story or explain how a product works far better than a few paragraphs of copy or static images.

In fact, statistics show that:

• 97% of video marketers reported that video increased user understanding of a product or service
• 76% of video marketers said video helped them increase sales
• Including a video on your landing page can increase conversions by more than 80%
• 56% of consumers believe that a company should have video content on its website

People are more likely to become emotionally attached to your brand after watching a video, which makes them more likely to convert.

Abandoned baskets

Abandoned baskets (or carts) are a big problem for ecommerce businesses. Is your design letting you down and increasing the likelihood of shoppers abandoning their baskets? If so, it is important to find out where the problems are and improve your design.

Look at:

• Are there too many steps?
• Is it too slow to load?
• Is it confusing?

Even minor inconveniences will be enough to drive people away. Redesign your shopping process to eliminate any friction and turn almost-sales into actual sales.

Unless your website converts, there really is no point having a website. Today’s consumers expect results, and they expect them fast. If your content is good, but your sales and conversions are low, you need to review your design.

Web design is about so much more than the look, it’s about the experience for consumers. Your website should look good, load quickly, navigate seamlessly and work well on mobile, so that visitors keep coming back and don’t consider doing business elsewhere. But that isn’t easy to do if you’re not a web designer yourself.

Using a web design company will make all the difference. Cotswold Web is a web design and marketing agency based in Cheltenham, with years of experience and knowledge of all the latest business software solutions. We can work with you to come up with a creative website design to increase your sales and conversions.

Why you need a good customer database for marketing

Fri, 09 Sep 2022 09:27:57 GMT

With online sales continuing to grow, companies of all sizes and in all industries need an effective customer database for marketing. A good customer database will help you keep track of who your customers are and what they are buying – so you can target them with the right offers at the right time.

The amount of data created by consumers, whether from shopping online or using loyalty cards in store, is growing fast. The insight from this data continues to grow, giving businesses a real insight into their customers. An effective customer database will allow marketing teams to really put this data to work for you.

Businesses that don’t have a customer database, or which don’t have an effective database marketing strategy, are failing to reap the benefits of database marketing.

Database marketing isn’t a free solution, as you will need to implement and maintain a customer relationship management (CRM) system. But you should be able to offset those costs with the increased profits generated from your effective customer database.

So, what are the advantages of a good customer database, how can you use it and what are the benefits to your customers?

First things first, what is a customer database?

A customer database is an interactive and intelligent contact list. It stores valuable information about your customers, such as email addresses, demographics (age, gender, geographical location, profession etc) and purchasing history.

Using the database, you can see who is buying your products or services, so you can work to retain these existing customers and acquire more similar customers to further develop your customer base and increase sales.

A good customer database will help you to make more informed selling decisions, as the most likely customers for you in the future are those who have already bought from you in the past.

Why do I need a customer database?

As online sales increase, making the most of online traffic – both sales and non-sales visitors – is crucial for driving your business forward.

With a good customer database, you can:

• Identify and prioritise your most loyal customers
• Separate your audience into relevant segments
• Analyse insights in real-time to track customers throughout the decision-making process
• Use customer feedback and behavior to update your marketing strategies
• Improve your level of brand awareness and identification

Focusing on building a customer database will give you valuable insights into your customers, which will help you to make sales decisions. The database insights will give you a clearer plan for upselling to a particular audience and improving your business performance.

For example, by analysing your customer database, you might find that one of your products is particularly appealing to the 18 to 29-year-old age group. You could then look to promote this product with links to buy it on social media, where younger consumers are more likely to visit.

A good customer database also gives a valuable opportunity to build rapport with your customers. Using information from your database, you can keep them informed about new products and services.

Analysing your database will help you identify your most loyal and most profitable customers. This will help you to single them out for special treatment, which shows how much you appreciate them. Rewarding them with personalised offers will help build a stronger relationship and encourage them to become long-term, repeat customers.

Using your customer database also offers an opportunity to show the human side of your business. Interacting with your customers in a way that appeals to them – whether by email or social media - shows them that you care. Effective and honest communication with customers leads to brand loyalty. Just be careful not to say too much too often and spam your customers!

With a customer database, you ‘own’ your contacts, which is very different from your followers on social media. While social media is valuable, your posts will only reach a very small fraction of your followers. If a platform ever shuts down, you will instantly lose all of those contacts.

How do I build a customer database?

There are a number of different ways to collect customer information. One of the most common is to ask customers to set up an account when they buy from you online. For them, this has the advantage of making future purchases quicker, as they won’t need to input their information next time they buy from you. You could also ask for customer details on your website in return for a special offer or lead magnet, using sign-up forms and pop-ups.

There are many apps and tools which can sync customer data when they make an online purchase and help you build your customer database. Do some research, ask for recommendations and find one that suits your business best. Once you’ve chosen a solution, give your employees the training they need so that they can make the very best of it.

Once you have your customer information on your database, you can use it for future engagement. Offer discount codes, free shipping or free gifts with an order at key times, such as the customer’s birthday or as a new customer welcome.

What information should I include in a customer database?

A customer database is essential whether you work in the business to business (B2B) or business to consumer (B2C) markets. The data you capture will vary slightly depending on whether you operate in B2B or B2C.

B2B marketers should capture:

• Name, job title and length of time at current company
• Details of the company, including name, size, employee numbers and industry
• Profiles and information of key decisionmakers at the company
• Estimated annual sales figures and other important financial information about the company
• Details of any current or previous marketing partnerships

B2C marketers should capture:

• Customer name
• Contact information including email and phone number
• Gender and other demographic information
• Location-based data
• Transaction history and customer behaviour information

Managing your database

You will need a reliable and easy-to-use system for your customer database. There are plenty to choose from.

Your customer details need to be secure (don’t forget GDPR!), manageable and accessible. Customer relationship management (CRM) will track new leads and you can use this to create an email marketing campaign, and then send relevant communications through to a segmented customer list. This can drive repeat sales and begin positive, human engagement with your customers.

Data accuracy

For a customer or prospective customer, there are few things more likely to turn them away from your company than inaccurate emails, such as emailing after they’ve unsubscribed or giving them the wrong name, location or birthday.

So it’s important to clean up your customer database frequently, getting rid of contacts with out-of-date or inaccurate information and merging contacts which have multiple profiles. This allows you to focus all your attention on reaching the people who could be your next customer and continue nurturing those who already are.

Abandoned baskets

One area where a customer database can come in very handy is with abandoned online shopping baskets (or carts). We’ve all done it – put an item in our online basket and then not gone through with the purchase. Either we have found something we like better or for a better price elsewhere, or we have simply got distracted and forgotten all about it.

The latest UK statistics from Statista put the abandoned basket rate at 72% for shoppers using a computer, 74% when using a tablet and 80% for those shopping on mobile. That is a huge number of potential sales to miss out on. How can you convert some of these into paying customers using your database?

If a customer has already registered with you (eg for faster checkout for future purchases), you have their data.

So when they put an item in their basket and forget about it, you can send them a quick reminder to revisit the transaction. Online shopping platforms, such as Shopify, can integrate with CRM software to send reminder emails to the customer, so they will hopefully go ahead and complete their purchase.

Privacy

Maintaining the privacy of your customers’ information is a critical consideration when setting up a customer database. When deciding which system to use, it is essential to work with companies that have strong data policies, to ensure your customers’ information remains private right from the start.

When talking to customers about adding their details to a database, it is essential to initially ask for consent to store their data and let them know what you’ll use it for. This will not only be reassuring to customers, but will also mean you stay within the law. The General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) has clear guidelines on handling customer data. Breaching them could mean a fine, as well as a loss of reputation. In a competitive market, that is something no company can afford to do.

Understandably, customers may not want to stay on your database forever. So it is important to provide an unsubscribe option at the bottom of your emails. Being able to unsubscribe is not only good for your customers and potential customers, it will also ensure that you continue to reach the most relevant audience for your brand.

If you haven’t already got a good customer database for your business, it’s time to get started. Your database will allow you to reach a large audience and help solve their problems by targeting them with your products or services.

If you already have a database, it is important to regularly check your data, to ensure it is accurate and up to date, so that it works effectively for you.
Although setting up a database requires some initial, and ongoing, investment of time and money, this will almost certainly be outweighed by an increase in both sales and customer loyalty.

13 digital marketing tips for small businesses

Thu, 30 Jun 2022 12:20:48 GMT

If you are new to selling online, the phrase ‘digital marketing’ can sound a bit daunting. It sounds like something only someone with a degree or specialist experience can do, but in fact it just means using the internet to promote products and services.

For a small business, getting the word out about your brand, products and services can seem challenging. Your brand is small and relatively unknown and changing that will take time and money.

Digital marketing is something which everyone can (and should) be doing to promote their business. It takes a number of different forms, and the key thing is to choose those which will work well for your brand and products, and which will prove cost-effective, giving you the best possible return on your investment (ROI).

Read on for digital marketing tips to help your small business…

Know your audience

One of the biggest digital marketing mistakes you can make is to assume that everyone will want to buy your products or services. While large companies with multiple products can appeal to wide audiences, the reality is that your audience is likely to be much smaller.

Consider whether your brand appeals to women more than men? Younger people, middle aged people or older people? People living in a particular area? People with higher or lower incomes?

Think also about the problems and priorities your audience may have and how your brand can help with those. What will give them that final push to make a purchase?

All of this information will help you create a buyer persona of your ideal customer. It may all seem like a big job – and it is. But once you’ve done it, you’ve got the starting point for all your marketing activity.

Knowing your audience helps you to understand who to communicate with and how best to do it. That way, you can target your marketing effectively – there’s no point investing in TikTok if your audience are all over 55!

Your website

A professional looking website is essential for digital marketing. Your website will show potential customers what your brand stands for, as well as showcasing your products or services.

Your website is something you really own and control (unlike social media channels). It can be as simple or as complex as you like – it could be anything from an ecommerce site to a simple introduction to your company.

If you have a bricks and mortar business, such as a coffee shop or hair salon, the most important information your website can include is your address, phone number and opening hours.

Have a clear brand

What does your brand stand for? What makes it different from or better than the competition?

Your brand is your name, your logo, the colours you use and the design of everything from your products to your website to the sign above your door (if you have one). Having a strong brand identity will make you look more professional, help your business stand out and make it more memorable.

If people remember your brand, they will start to relate to it, and you are on your way to converting them to a customer.

Focus on the quick wins

Digital marketing can be a full-time job, it could even be a full-time job for a whole team of people. But the chances are, it is just one part of your job, so you can’t do it all.

Instead, focus on the quick wins – the areas which will work well for the target audience you’ve identified and which you know work well in your industry.

There are many potential quick wins, which we will look at separately in more detail, including pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, social media and email marketing. You want to choose the ones which will generate the most sales for the minimum of work and financial investment.

Don’t forget existing customers

You probably already have a group of people who fit your target audience and have developed some loyalty to your brand – your existing customers.

Existing customers are very important to a business and it is essential to keep nurturing them. Research has shown that, on average, it costs five times as much to acquire a new customer as it costs to keep an existing one.

Your existing customers have already bought from you, so they are far more likely to buy again, as long as you have given them a good service. Nurture them with special offers and opportunities for repeat purchases.

Don’t forget the power of word-of-mouth too. If your existing customers are happy with your products or your service, they are likely to tell others, which is one of the very best promotional tools there is.

Online reviews

If your existing customers are happy with their experience of your business, encourage them to let others know through online reviews. When a happy customer talks online about your fantastic brand, their friends and even total strangers are more likely to choose your business over a competitor.

You can claim your business on online review sites like TripAdvisor or Trust Pilot. Sites like these, as well as Google, Which? and many more, are a great choice for customer reviews. Alternatively, customers could send reviews to you, which you could post on your own website, or they may choose to share them on social media.

Wherever they are posted, it’s important that you are aware of your online reviews and take the time to read and respond to them publicly. By responding to your reviews, whether good or bad, you are showing that you care about what your customers think. Just make sure to spend the time preparing a measured and polite response to any negative reviews, offering to remedy the situation.

Google Business Profile

A Google Business Profile, sometimes known as Google My Business, is a free way to claim your own physical business on Google.

A Business Profile for your store will help turn people who find you on Google Search and Maps into new customers. Use your Business Profile to highlight essential information, such as your opening hours and contact details, and show what makes your business unique. You can also include photos and your logo to really personalise your profile and make it stand out from the crowd.

A Google Business Profile is another way to connect with your customers and potential customers, by responding to reviews and sending and receiving messages.

Start a blog

Once you’ve got your website up and running, it makes sound business sense to include a blog as part of your website.

Blogging is a great way to attract organic traffic to your site, particularly for people who haven’t yet committed to buy from you.

Your blog will feature a variety of relevant subjects, from a focus on particular products to the history of your business, as well as comment and in-depth analysis on issues within your industry. If your industry is particularly niche, your blog is a way to show that you are credible and knowledgeable in that sector.

Publishing regularly – whether twice a week or twice or month – will help boost your website’s visibility online. And a blog is probably the best way to boost your SEO.

Adding a call-to-action (CTA) to posts is an easy way to collect email addresses, which will help you to stay in touch with potential customers.

SEO

SEO is short for search engine optimisation. It is about making your website more visible on searches on Google and other search engines, so that when someone looks for a product or service like yours, your brand is near the top of the list.

The key to SEO is to rank for the right keywords. What are the important things which make your brand stand out and which people might search for? Clearly, you’re not going to rank on Google for really broad terms like ‘Garden’ or ‘Home improvements', so focus on the keywords which make your brand unique and be sure to use them in your content – particularly your blog. Google gives extra weight to keywords which are used in titles and headers, so make sure they are included in the right place.

If you are a local business, it is especially important to include local place names in your keywords, for example ‘Garden furniture Tewkesbury’.
To help you analyse your current SEO (and check on your competitors too!), Neil Patel has a free and easy-to-use SEO Analyzer Tool on his website. This will let you know which keywords you rank for, along with how often they are used.

Once you can see how your business is ranking against the competition, you can put the work in to improving your SEO.

SEO isn’t a quick win and it usually takes around six months for a piece of content to make a difference, but it is worth putting in the effort for the benefits it will bring in the future.

Start an email list

Email is the preferred form of marketing for many customers, yet can often be overlooked by businesses.

You don’t want to bombard your contacts with emails, but here are just some of the stats from Hubspot which prove why email marketing is a must-have:

• Email generates £42 for every £1 spent, which is a 4,200% ROI
• Across all industries, the average email open rate is 19.8%, the click-through rate is 11.3%, and the bounce rate is 9.4%
• 78% of marketers have seen an increase in email engagement over the last 12 months
• 99% of email users check their inbox every day, with some checking 20 times a day
• 74% of Baby Boomers think email is the most personal channel to receive communications from brands, followed by 72% of Gen X, 64% of Millennials and 60% of Gen Z

Personalised emails are the most effective, so use a customer relationship management (CRM) system to store information about your contacts and track your interactions with them.

Use every opportunity you can to collect email addresses (from CTAs on your website to the till in your physical store) to build your email marketing list. The larger your email list, the more successful your business will be!

Experiment with different types of email and also experiment with the day of the week or time of day you send them, as it’s likely that some will be more popular than others.

Use social media

Every brand should have a social media presence, but it isn’t necessary or advisable to use all of them. Platforms like Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and TikTok give you more opportunities to share everything from special offers to your latest blog post. They are also a great way to grow your brand’s followers and engage with your audience.

Focus on the top two social media platforms which are relevant for your brand and audience. TikTok, for example is a useful way to reach Generation Z, the very youngest generation, while Facebook has by far the biggest number of users – 2.93 billion worldwide at the start or 2022.

Before deciding which social media platform to use, consider:

• Do you have resources for creating graphics or videos (especially for TikTok, Instagram and YouTube)?
• Do you plan to use social media for brand awareness, to increase traffic, increase sales or all of these?
• Will you need an additional staff member to run this platform, or will it be easy to maintain?

Social media can be a great customer service tool and it’s essential that someone checks comments and messages regularly and responds to them, to help build trust in your brand.

PPC advertising

There are a number of ways to advertise online, but pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, particularly on Google, is the most effective for many businesses. As organic traffic through SEO takes a while to build up, PPC advertising is a quick win to get your digital marketing off the ground.

Google Ads are the most effective for potential customers searching the internet for a particular solution or product. As an advertising listing, your product or business will appear higher up on searches than organic content.
The key to making PPC work is to focus on keywords which are unique to your business, to make sure your company is visible and can compete with bigger players in your industry.

To make your PPC advertising as effective as possible, you will need to optimise your landing pages on your website. When you are paying per click, you want to be sure that every click counts and increase the chances of customers going ahead and buying from you.

Alternatively, you may prefer to use social media advertising, with highly targeted ads for the right audience. Most of the social media platforms offer affordable advertising and some will offer your customers the chance to shop direct through ads.

Use video

According to HubSpot research, more than 50% of consumers want to see videos from brands – and that percentage is even higher for a younger target audience.

Video is essential for TikTok and YouTube, but you can also create and host videos on your own website and other social media. Making videos doesn’t need to be complicated or expensive – it just requires a smartphone.

YouTube is actually the second biggest search engine after Google, so to reach the biggest audiences, you should host your videos on YouTube, with a link to them from your website. Hosting videos on YouTube also make sense in terms of SEO, as video can slow down your own website, which in turn is damaging for SEO.

Getting started with digital marketing, or making improvements to your existing digital marketing, can seem like a daunting prospect. The online marketplace is huge and it can be hard for smaller brands to get heard.

Whether you are focusing mainly on social media, PPC or your blog, the key is always to think about your target audience and choose the keywords which will help to get your business in front of the right people.

By following these tips and focusing on the quick wins which work for you, you can make a difference, reach a bigger audience and ultimately improve your sales and your bottom line.s and set people straight with some facts.

Remember to keep it friendly and non-confrontational and to use language which is easy to understand.

25 blog post ideas for business

Fri, 13 May 2022 10:26:03 GMT

Every business, no matter how large or small, should have a blog.

It is a great way to bring new customers to your brand through search engine optimisation (SEO). Writing about niche topics in your industry area is also a great way to show your expertise – even for a new or very small business.

It’s important to blog regularly – whether that’s twice a week, twice a month or somewhere in between. But what happens when you run out of ideas for your blog?

We’ve come up with 25 blog post ideas, which will work for most industries, so you should never find yourself short of inspiration for your blog.

News from your industry

Breaking news in your industry could cause alarm or raise questions from your audience. Get in there quickly with the answers on your blog and it will instantly turn your business into a credible source of information.

Case studies

A case study is a real life story of your product or service in action, told by someone who has used it. With photos and some background on the person and their needs, a case study is far more powerful than you singing the praises of your own product. It’s also more powerful than a simple testimonial.

The great thing about case studies is that you can run them fairly regularly. Different customers showcasing different products or services means every one of them will be unique.

Current trends

Reporting on current trends on your blog is another time you need to act pretty fast – as some trends change very quickly.

But if your business, product or service can tap into a trend – which could be anything from a fashion trend to a food trend, the latest TV show or a viral trend on TikTok – blogging about it can really drive traffic to your site.

A how-to post

People are always searching online to find out how to do things, so make it easy for them with a how-to post. This could be for your own product or service, but it could also be for something related in your industry. Clear instructions, illustrated with photos or short videos, could make your blog very valuable to someone looking for answers.

Guest posts from industry experts

You know your industry well, but are there others who know it just as well or even better? And are they bigger names than your business? Invite them to share their ideas on your blog.

Guest posts from industry experts are a great way to boost your traffic, as they will more than likely let their audience know about their guest post. And the more prominent the expert is, the higher the chance you have for generating more traffic and leads.

Answer frequently asked questions

Do you get the same few questions asked of your business all the time? Use your blog to answer them in detail.

Write one blog post per question, to come up with a useful and informative resource for your customers and prospective customers.

Meet the team

Every business has somebody behind it – or lots of somebodies. The people behind the products and services can help your customers relate to your brand better, so use your blog as a way to introduce them to your audience.

Remember to focus on them as individuals, not just as part of your business.

A day in the life

Similar to a meet the team post, is a day in the life post. For a small or local business, part of the reason people buy from you is because they like you and can relate to you. So give them more detail, with photos or short videos on your blog.

What exactly do you get up to in the day? What time do you start work? Who do you talk to and meet with? Do you spend time brainstorming ideas? Do you package up your products ready for delivery? Does your dog come into the office with you every day?

The more detail you give, the better people will relate to your brand.

Seasonal posts

While most of your blog should be evergreen – relevant all year round and for several years - creating occasional seasonal content can help you attract more readers at the relevant time.

It is often fairly easy to give a seasonal angle to your products or services. The big one is always Christmas, but there’s also Halloween and Easter, plus general spring, summer and holiday season.

Tutorials

How often have you bought something to do one thing and ignored the other 10 things it can do? Use your blog (along with photos and videos) to give more detail on everything your product can do. Knowing about all the functions will make it seem far more valuable to potential customers and could be the final push they need to go ahead and buy.

Interview an expert

Experts, thought leaders or influencers have lots of knowledge and can offer insights into your industry, which can boost the credibility of your blog.

Making connections with influencers and experts can help grow your brand and get it noticed.

A solution to a problem

No doubt your product or service is designed to solve somebody’s problem, so blog about the ways in which it can help provide a solution.

And if your product has recently had an update or relaunch, blog about the new functions and the difference they make.

Thank your customers

Your business would be nothing without customers, so take the time to focus on them and thank them for their support. Whether you’ve received lots of lovely personal messages or seen a rise in sales, it’s all worth celebrating and thanking them for.

Review related products

Nearly all products and services will benefit from using other products and services alongside them. So use your blog to review non-competitive products and services. A simple example would be a gardening business recommending some of the best gardening tools they use every day.

As well as providing content for your blog, this is a good way to make connections with other businesses – remember to share the post with the businesses you mention, so they can share it on their social media.

A comparison post

Similar to a review post, compare two or more similar products or services and put them to the test.

This is likely to include one of your own products (but doesn’t have to!). If it does include your own product, you will obviously conclude that yours is the best, but try to give a balanced view and highlight the positives of the other products. This will help your business to come across as one which is trustworthy.

To make it even ‘fairer’, you could get someone from outside the business to write the post for you.

A round-up of the year

Towards the end of the year, create a round-up post (or even several round-up posts) relating to your industry. This could be a compilation of some of your own best material, but would work best by including external content too.

Depending on your industry, it could be something like your favourite software of the year, must-read books or even funniest memes.

Share some interesting stats

People love statistics. They make for an interesting read and are very shareable via social media. So rather than just include a few stats in a blog post on a specific subject, why not create a blog post consisting purely of stats relating to your industry?

Every industry has lots of interesting stats. Research organisations and industry bodies will produce regular stats, or you could do some research and come up with your own!

The chances are you’ve already got some of statistics available in existing content, so it’s just a case of repackaging your content into something new.

Dispel myths

Are there any myths about your product or industry? Do people believe it’s bad for the environment or that it is too expensive? Your blog is your space to dispel those myths and set people straight with some facts.

Remember to keep it friendly and non-confrontational and to use language which is easy to understand.

Welcome a new team member

For a small business, welcoming a new team member is a big thing, especially if they are your very first employee.

Introduce them to your audience and talk about how they will enhance your business, but also give some detail which makes them relatable, including any hobbies and interests they are willing to share with your readers.

Share your failures

Very few businesspeople have instant success. Most people and businesses will make mistakes along the way. Sharing the story of your failures on your blog, and what you’ve learned from them, will make you and your business appear more relatable.

Have a rant

Rants often make popular blog posts, especially if they are well informed.

Industry news won’t always be positive. If a rise in costs or regulations is going to hit your business hard, you can use your blog to have a rant about it. Add quotes from industry bodies or other local businesses to back up what you have to say.

Just remember to keep your tone measured to avoid annoying and alienating your audience!

Relate your brand or industry to popular culture

Using a pop culture reference, such as a film, TV show, song or fashion trend and comparing that to your brand, niche or industry will give your blog an interesting twist and potentially help to reach a wider audience.

The possibilities are endless, you just need to get a bit creative and think outside the box. Some ideas are:

· What The Avengers can teach us about X

· Why X is like running a marathon

· Why X is as cutting edge as current TV show/ film/ fashion trend

Just remember to keep it positive – comparing your business to an episode of EastEnders will instantly make it seem depressing!

Video blog post

Blogs are usually seen as something written, but there is no reason why you shouldn’t produce an entire video blog post (or vlog) instead. Depending on the demographic of your audience, many people prefer video to the written word. So why not give video a go?

The key is to focus on one subject, to be yourself and to keep it informal, brief and to the point.

A vlog can either stand alone or can be bonus material as part of a written blog post.

Create a cheat sheet

Products and services are designed to make life easier for their users. To make it even easier, you could create a blog post around the steps a user needs to take to get the best out of your product – whether that is creating easy marketing emails, a beautiful garden on a budget or cleaning up household stains and spills.

A cheat sheet post is very useful for busy people and, if your post offers the solutions they need, they will be sure to refer back to it.

Run a giveaway

One of the surest ways to bring visitors to your blog (although only in the short term) is to run a giveaway. Few people can resist a freebie and it’s a great way to get some attention for your products. You might choose to give away your top-seller, a new release or a bundle of products.

There are lots of online tools to help you set up run a giveaway easily and legally.

Once the giveaway is over, you just have to make sure the new visitors keep coming back to your blog for your quality content!

Whether you blog twice a week or twice a month, these ideas should help to give plenty of content and inspiration for your business blog.

Remember to mix up the type of articles you post to keep it fresh and stop it from becoming boring. For example, it is interesting to meet your team members, but don’t write seven consecutive posts on individual team members - remember to mix it up with industry news, posts from industry experts and lots more. That way, you will have a blog which is both interesting and a useful resource for your readers.

Why you should use a local web company for your website

Tue, 19 Apr 2022 10:41:16 GMT

If you need a brand new website or an update to an old one, do you look for a design company in London or Manchester? Do you search for a national company with a good reputation? Or the cheapest web company you can find? While any of these options may work out for you, it makes a lot of sense to go with a local web company instead.

There are many reasons why you should use a local web company for your website…

Face-to-face meetings

While a lot of business has moved online, via Teams or Zoom, over the past couple of years, there is no better way to share ideas than through a face-to-face meeting.
When you hire someone to design and build your website, you want to make sure that you're on the same page and can work well together.

With a face-to-face meeting, you can take along ideas and documents and really discuss everything you want, while getting a good feel for your local website developer.
When you're dealing with a company in a completely different area, or even a different country, you will never have the chance to sit down and discuss your plans in person.

They're not going to vanish

When you hire a company that you only connect with digitally, you can never really be sure that they aren’t going to just disappear one day.

If they suddenly stop returning your calls or responding to your emails, you can’t just drop into the office to find out what’s going on. In the meantime, you’ve got no website and you’ve lost the money and time you’ve already invested.

When you hire a local web design company like Cotswold Web, they will always be accountable to you. We are in the same community as you and a small business just like yours.

They know how to generate local traffic

When you hire a local agency, your customers are a part of the same community as the people who work at the agency. When running a business where you want to reach customers and clients in your local area, a local web designer is the obvious choice for helping you generate local traffic – and local footfall, if you have a bricks and mortar store.

Local web companies already have a good knowledge of your area and have undoubtedly promoted other services and products in the area already.

More often than not, the staff of a local web design company will also live in the area you are trying to target. This means that they are also part of your target audience. So they will know who you’re trying to reach, and what kinds of things your website should do in order to achieve this.

Compare this with a company in a completely different area, where the staff may never even have set foot in your local area before, and the decision really is a no-brainer. Larger web design companies based in other areas won’t know what will specifically work in your local area and for the demographic you are trying to target.

They could help you link up with potential customers

A local web design company already has lots of other local connections, as they will work with a range of companies in your area in different industries. This means that they are in touch with a lot of people and organisations who could potentially benefit you in some way. Their network is your network, and they can help to link you up with potential customers or suppliers.

As local web companies usually form a personal relationship with their clients, they will feel comfortable passing their details to you - or your details to them - if they feel that the two companies could work well together.

They know your competitors

A local web company won’t just know your target audience, they will undoubtedly know some of your competitors too! As long as there is no conflict of interest, they can use the knowledge of how your competitors are attracting customers to help your business do the same.

While larger web designers will have a general understanding of the competition, they won’t have this sort of essential insider knowledge which can really help give your website the edge.

Better accountability

A local business is going to be much more accountable than one in another part of the country. This is because their reputation locally is at stake, which means they will provide you with the best possible service in order to keep their good reputation.

Local web design companies generally work for a variety of small and medium sized businesses in the area, and every client they have has the potential to help them get new clients – as long as they provide an excellent service.

Local testimonials

Local testimonials are very closely linked to local accountability. A local web designer will almost certainly have already designed websites for lots of other local companies. It’s likely that this will include businesses you already know. This means you can get some real-world reviews by contacting your web designer’s clients directly to get honest, unbiased feedback of their work.

You will also be able to ask other local people and businesses for any recommendations of local web design companies that are great to work with.

Ongoing support

Web design isn’t something that just happens once. The internet is constantly evolving. Staying on top of current trends and updates with knowledgeable web support from a local business will help ensure the ongoing success of your own business.

And if something goes wrong, or you need a minor update, it is far easier to get this from a local agency than from one hundreds of miles away, especially if you have already built a good relationship with them.

Investing in your local economy

Over the last couple of years, we have all become very aware of supporting our local economies. If you spend your money with a local web design company, much of that money will be kept in your local community and be spent with other local businesses, employing local people.

If you spend your money with a company in London or Manchester, nobody in your area will benefit from that money in any way.

By working with a local web designer, as a local business owner, you will become part of a community of local businesses which supports each other.

If your business is based in Gloucestershire, the Cotswolds or the surrounding areas, Cotswold Web can give you all of these advantages and more. We know the area, the people and the diverse businesses operating here.

Cotswold Web has designed, developed, supported and marketed hundreds of websites. Whenever we produce a website, we focus on how it will generate you more business and not just on how it looks.

We bring countless hours of design experience to every website we build and will create beautiful layouts to drive the type of customer actions you value most — whether that is sales, footfall or something else.

If you are in the Gloucestershire or Cotswold area and are looking for a reputable local web company, which will help you build a professional and high performing website, get in touch! We’d love to help you get your new project up and running.

The importance of a professional website for any business

Tue, 22 Mar 2022 12:43:26 GMT

It doesn’t matter if you’re running a one-man band or a multinational enterprise and it doesn’t matter if your business is long established or it just started yesterday, a professional website is important for any business.

If your website doesn’t imply professionalism, quality and credibility, potential customers will be scared away. They will miss out on your fantastic products or services and you will miss out on those all-important sales.

Of course, you could build a website yourself. There are lots of no-cost or very low-cost options out there, like Wix, Squarespace and WordPress, but do you know how best to use them? Can you showcase your brand in the best possible way and present a seamless user experience to your customers and prospective customers? And do you even have the time to do it?

The answer to all these questions is almost certainly ‘no’.

If you’re not experienced in web design, you could be wasting valuable time, which could be better spent elsewhere in your business, rather than leaving the web design to professionals who can really make a difference to your sales, conversions or footfall.

You may be worried that a professional website will be too expensive for a small or new business. But you may be surprised to discover that it is remarkably affordable – and you will definitely see a return on your investment.

Here’s why it is important to have a professional website for any business…

Skills and knowledge

Professional website designers, who spend all their time designing and building sites, can get your site up and running far quicker than someone who is trying to do it themselves. They also have skills and knowledge far beyond those of someone who dabbles in Squarespace or WordPress, so they can build a site which really delivers.

User experience

Professional web designers have tools which allow them to see exactly what visitors look at when they see your page. Along with information on browsing actions, professional designers know exactly which parts of your site work and which don’t. They can fix problems visitors might not even notice consciously, but which may discourage them from returning to your site.

Small adjustments to the user experience (UX), which someone without professional knowledge would probably be unaware of, can make a real difference to your bottom line.

Strong branding

A do-it-yourself drag and drop website will never do your brand justice, however many pretty templates it offers you.

A custom design by a professional website designer will help set your brand apart from the competition and really highlight what your strengths are.

A strong brand will make your business more memorable, which will make it more likely for customers to come back to you in the future.

SEO

Search engine optimisation, or SEO, will help you to attract new customers. Professional website designers will optimise your site for SEO, by building content around the keywords you want your site to rank for, such as ‘garden design Gloucestershire’ or ‘tattoo parlour Cheltenham’.

Over time, SEO will help to attract new customers to your business, by making your website more visible on Google and other search engines.

Clearly show your products and services

Your website is your shop window, so you want to show your products and services at their very best. A professional designer will help ensure you have the high quality photos, images and video on your website to really showcase your products and services.

They can also use quality images and video on your website to give visitors a feel of your physical location – such as a coffee shop or hair salon – to inspire them to visit.

More leads and customers

A good website will generate leads for your business 24 hours a day, because it has effective calls to action (CTAs) throughout the sales funnel.

Getting the sales funnel right is something which takes skill and experience. A professional website designer has the experience to get it right first time and will generate more leads and more sales than a DIY site. So even though a professional website costs more than building it yourself, it will soon give you a good return on investment (ROI).

Credibility and authority

People like to buy from a brand they can trust. If your company is very new or very small, how do they know they can trust it?

A visitor will decide within a fraction of a second whether to trust your business. A professional website, with a seamless UX, fast loading speeds and no downtime looks like it belongs to a credible and trustworthy business.

If your website appears credible, people will be much more likely to buy from you than from a business which is selling the same, but has a website which was clearly built by an amateur.

If your website doesn’t look professional, even if the content is relevant, potential customers won’t see it as being as trustworthy as other similar sites.

Improved customer service

A professional website, which includes a chatbot and frequently asked questions (FAQs) will give a better service for customers, as they should be able to find the answers to nearly all of their questions without having to phone or email your business. That means it will also save you time and money, as rather than pay people to answer customer queries, they can work in other areas of the business, which will be more beneficial to your bottom line.

Here at Cotswold Web, we have over 50 years’ experience of marketing and web design between us, and we also have access to the very latest cutting-edge technology – a real win-win for our customers!

We’ve worked on projects for companies and organisations of all sizes. We know what can go wrong and, most importantly, we know how to make a business successful online.

Our experience means we will build a website which will drive customers to take the actions you want them to take – whether that is sales, signing up for subscriptions, footfall to your bricks and mortar business or something else.

Of course, our websites look pretty (or however you want them to look!), but there’s far more to web design than that. Every time we design and build a website, we focus on how it will generate more business for you.

We all know how frustrating it is when a website loads slowly – and it’s bad for your search engine optimisation (SEO) too. Our sites are all optimised to load at lightning speed, to meet with Google best practice. This stops potential customers from leaving your site immediately and also helps improve your search ranking.

The good news is, our professional website designs aren’t expensive. We have designs to suit all budgets. And even if you opt from one of our simplest designs, your business will benefit from our years of experience and all the latest technology.

You might have been wondering how you can afford a professional website, especially for a small or new business. But it’s important to remember that a professional website will really strengthen your brand. It will help your business to grow and drive potential customers to it 24/7. The question should be how you can afford not to have a professional website!

11 essential tips for local SEO

Fri, 18 Feb 2022 12:13:26 GMT

If you run a small, local independent business, you might wonder how you will ever appear in Google searches, when you are up against the biggest names in your industry.

The answer is good local SEO.

While SEO generally is about appearing in searches anywhere in the country or the world, local SEO is about appearing in searches in your own local area. It is a way for your business to compete more effectively with big brands and their big advertising budgets.

You may be surprised to discover that 46% of Google searches are for local information. So local SEO (search engine optimisation) is essential for small businesses, particularly for those who have a bricks and mortar presence. It means local people looking for small suppliers, coffee shops, hairdressers or anything else can find your business.

Nearly nine out of 10 people search for a local company on their smartphone at least once a week. From that search, 72 per cent will visit a business within five miles. Without good local SEO, those customers would be very unlikely to find your business.

By following local SEO best practice, small businesses can increase organic traffic from searches by local people – and in the process increase footfall and sales.

Follow these tips to improve your local SEO…

Google My Business

Possibly the most important thing you can do for your local SEO is to set up a Google My Business account.

Google My Business is a tool that enables you to manage and optimise your Business Profile on Google. Business Profiles appear on Google Maps and in the local results of searches on Google.

A complete Business Profile offers a snapshot of your business, including its best features, right on the search engine results page (SERP).
Google My Business is a free tool. When you set it up, you personalise it by adding photos, opening hours, contact details, a link to your website and any other essential information for customers.

From there, you can use Google My Business to share updates, respond to reviews and connect with customers on Google, in a similar way to you would on social media.

Through your Google My Business dashboard, you can incorporate keywords into your Business Profile and carry out other optimisations to help it rank in local results.

A complete and accurate Business Profile will rank more highly on searches, so it is important to provide the requested information in every section of your Google My Business dashboard.

The final approach to using Google My Business for SEO is all about the trust component of Google’s algorithm. It is important to have a steady stream of reviews coming in and especially important to respond to them - as both the reviews and your responses appear on the Business Profile.

Make sure Google knows that your business is active by regularly uploading photos and publishing posts to your Business Profile through Google My Business.

If you’ve already got a Google My Business account, spend some time working through these steps to check that you have included all of the essential information and it is all accurate and up to date.

Name, address and phone number

It might seem obvious, but for local SEO to work, you must ensure you include your name, address and phone number (this is sometimes abbreviated to NAP) on your website. The most common place for these is in the footer of your site, as well as on your ‘Contact us’ page.

Make your phone numbers clickable, so that potential customers can call you direct from your website, rather than having to come out of your site and try to remember your phone number before entering it manually.

It is especially important that your name, address and phone number are consistent across the pages of your website, as well as on Google My Business, social media and anywhere else your business appears.

Add location pages

If your small business has a number of locations, make sure each of your sites has its own location page on your website. These should include the NAP for all of them and opening times, as well as any photos and reviews which mark a location out as unique from your other locations.

Add a map

What better way to help people find your location than to add a map to your website? With 86% of people looking up the location of a business on Google Maps, a map is essential for any small local business.

Use social media

Set up two or three social media accounts, which are the most relevant to the audience you are trying to reach – this could be Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok or YouTube.

Use social media to promote your brand and your products, but also use it to engage with customers and the local community. Not only will social media make you more visible to potential customers, it will also provide search engines with more information about your business and help boost your ranking.

Make sure you answer social media queries quickly and in a friendly manner to help build up your reputation as company which is nice to do business with.

Keep your information consistent across all of the platforms you use.

Regular updates

People are always interested in what a small, local business has been up to. It helps them connect with your business and helps them decide if it can meet their needs.

Regular updates could include an online portfolio of recent work on your website, as well as before and after photos if relevant – whether you are a builder or a hairdresser or something else.

Create local content

Blogging is essential to SEO, and local SEO is no exception. Use your blog to link in with local events or charities, covering them from the perspective of a local business owner.

Make sure to include all of the relevant geographical areas in the post eg Gloucestershire, Cheltenham and Cotswolds. If you run a very localised business, you should also include the neighbourhood name eg Charlton Kings or Bishops Cleeve and any unofficial local place names people use, such as ‘Tommies’ for Sir Thomas Rich’s School.

Always aim to make your content unique, so that when people search for it, your site is the only one which is offering what they are looking for.

It is also important to use dated content on your blog – so that Google understands the content is recent. You can update old posts with new information and give them a new date.

Be part of the local community

Go one step further from local blogging and boost your SEO by making sure your business is a real part of the local community.

The more you participate in the local community – from supporting local charities to holding a volunteer day, sponsoring local events or providing the kit for a children’s football team – the more digital PR your company will get.

Having your logo appear on materials for an event or children’s football shirts is a great way of increasing visibility, but it also increases your potential for appearing in the local media and on the website and social media of other organisations. All of these actions help to bring traffic to your own website and social media – as well as footfall to your bricks and mortar store.

Reviews from happy customers

Positive reviews are essential for local businesses. They will boost your presence on Google My Business, but also help encourage other local people to see your business as one which is trustworthy, reliable and worth buying from.

Of course you can wait and hope for reviews, but the best way to get them is to ask for them. You can either ask for them when you complete a sale or send an email afterwards to encourage a customer to write a review. Obviously you should only contact customers you are sure will have good things to say!

Don’t just get a handful of reviews and leave it at that. Acquiring reviews should be an ongoing process, as you want your potential customers to see recent reviews, rather than some from 2017.
There will always be a handful of bad reviews, but mitigate any damage by responding to them in a professional way. Hopefully the large number of positive reviews you get will offset any damage caused by the more negative reviews.

Reviews on your own website, Google My Business, Facebook and sites like Trip Advisor are all positive for your business.

Online business directories

There are thousands of online business directories listing small businesses. They are a great resource for people searching for local businesses, so it is important to be included in any that are relevant for your company – this could be directories specific to your industry (such as Checkatrade.com) or specific to your local area (such as uksmallbusinessdirectory.co.uk or visitcheltenham.com).

Yell.com is perhaps the biggest UK online business directory, covering a huge range of sectors and industries, and the whole of the UK. Potential customers use it to search a particular sort of business and a specific geographical area. Listing is free for businesses.

UK Small Business Directory lists more than 100 local small business directories where you can list the NAP of your business for free. Directory submission increases the online presence of your business and helps increase the authority of your website.

Many local newspapers have an online directory section and allow businesspeople to submit a listing for free.

Perform a local SEO audit

Does your website tick all the boxes for good local SEO, or is there more you could be doing? The best way to be sure is by performing a local SEO audit on your site and other related platforms, such as your social media and Google My Business. You could carry this out yourself or get an external company to do the work for you.

Things to check include:

• Google My Business – how does your company appear on the search engine results page (SERP)? Is the information on Google My Business accurate?

• Competitor audit – take a look at your competitor’s website and social media. Are they doing anything better than you? How are they ranking for the keywords you want to rank for? Try running them through a tool like Ubersuggest.

• Check your review responses – are you responding to all reviews? Responding to negative reviews is even more important than responding to positive ones!

• Review your own content – is your content up to date or does it need updating? Is all of your information accurate and consistent?

• Keyword review – do you include all the relevant keywords for your industry and especially for the local area?

• Audit business directories – double check the information held by all of the local online business directories. Is it accurate and up to date or is there anything missing? Remember – some of this information might not have come directly from you, so it is more likely to be incorrect.

Consumers are relying more than ever on search engines and online reviews to give them the information they need about even the very smallest businesses. Climbing the rankings on a search engine for a local business can be tough, but it’s not impossible.

Take the time to carry out a local SEO audit to see what you are missing and what you can improve on. Produce regular local content and boost your online activities by getting out and about in the community to meet local people and other businesses and build relationships.

By putting the work into your local SEO, you will see results in increased footfall and sales.

Part 5: 15 ways video will turn your website into a sales superstar

Fri, 04 Feb 2022 14:20:18 GMT

Converting website visitors into sales isn’t easy, but there are plenty of steps you can take to improve the likelihood of visitors going on to become paying customers. One of the best things you can do is to use video.

When it comes to shopping online, people want to see what they are buying and know exactly how it works. Video is the best way to do this, making it more likely visitors will go ahead with a purchase, as well as increasing the time they spend on your site.

And since the start of the pandemic two years ago, video has filled the gap where conferences, networking events, in-person meetings and even a quick drink with a client used to be.

Businesses have seen cost savings, an improved carbon footprint and even a better work-life balance for employees from moving from in-person meetings to video. Why spend time and money sending staff around the country, when they can work just as effectively from the office or at home from their laptops?

These statistics from Sendspark should be enough to persuade any business to use video more:

• 91% think the pandemic has made video marketing more important than ever
• 93% of brands report getting new customers from social media videos
• 90% of customers say video marketing helps them with buying decisions
• 74% of prospects who see a product in action on video will buy it
• 30% of marketers see video as even more important to the bottom line than their website

Video can help prospective customers notice your brand in the first place, can help you nurture those prospects and help move them through your sales funnel.

But Sendspark also found that only 32% of businesses are using video for sales activities, and 41% said they aren’t making the best use of video because it’s too difficult.

Whether you are targeting a B2B or B2C audience with your videos, remember that B2B decision-makers are people too, and have a lot in common with B2C consumers.

If you’re not already using video, why not? There are really compelling reasons why all businesses, whether B2B or B2C, should embrace video on their websites.

Some key things to remember are:

• Consumers and decision-makers respond well to personalised content that shows you understand their needs and concerns

• People are more likely to open messages that stand out in a crowded inbox – and video always stands out!

• Consumers remember and recall what they see in a video far better than what they read – an incredible 95% for video compared to just 10% for reading

• It is far easier to convey emotion and create empathy with video, which helps influence a lot of buying decisions

You might think that video is expensive, but the exact opposite can be true. Not only does it have great potential to increase sales, it can also help keep costs down, as the same content can be used again and again. This is particularly useful for areas like customer service (no more time spent on the phone trying to explain how a product works!).

So whether you are already using video or are completely new to it, it is clear that it provides the opportunities you are looking for to turn your website into a sales superstar.

Keep it short

Generally speaking, it’s best to keep your videos short and make sure you grab the viewer’s attention right from the start.

A 2018 study found that 75% of B2B videos were under two minutes long. This is especially important as around a third of video viewers give up watching within 30 seconds. So stick to three or four key points at the most.

If you have more than two minutes’ worth of material, it is worth breaking it down into two (or more) separate videos about each feature or function of your product.

Repurpose your best content

You’ve probably already got the perfect content for your video, it just might not be in video form!

Think about repurposing some of your best blog posts into video. This is especially relevant because people spend so much time on mobile devices – video is much easier to consume than great blocks of text.

Add video to your homepage

Including video on your homepage and key pages throughout you site is a more engaging and eye-catching way to draw visitors’ attention to your CTAs.

As video increases dwell time, having video on your homepage and across your website means people will spend longer on your site – getting them more interested in what you have to offer and ultimately increasing sales.

Homepage videos should be well-made and professional, but not overwhelming – make sure people can see the rest of your page too!

Post to YouTube

It’s important to host your videos on your own site, but if you really want to get them noticed, post them to YouTube.

YouTube is the second most-visited website in the world and you can also use it as a place to host your video when embedding it on your website.

Optimise your videos

If you are posting your videos to YouTube, you will have lots of tough competition. To help your video stand out, take the time to optimise it.

It’s important to use keywords (or tags) in your title and description (such as your brand name, a product description, your industry and your location). Your first tag should be the exact keyword you want to rank for, then your next tags should be variations of that keyword, followed by a couple of broader terms, like ‘fitness’ and ‘workouts’.

Tags are designed to help YouTube understand your content – so too many tags makes it confusing. Stick to five to eight of the most relevant tags.

Then create an engaging thumbnail, which makes people want to watch and find out more.

Make it accessible

Not everyone can hear very well and not everyone speaks your language, but you still want them to watch and understand your videos. Subtitles and closed captions are easy to add and can make a big difference in terms of accessibility.

In addition, lots of people like to watch videos on silent anyway – so that they don’t disturb their colleagues, sleeping children or the other passengers on a crowded train!

Make it shareable

The best way to get your videos seen by lots of people is by making them shareable on social media. The most shareable videos will be those which tell a story, tug on the heartstrings or make us laugh. The least shareable will be those which come across as a hard sell.

To ensure your videos really are shareable, make sure they conform to the criteria of the social media channel you want them to be shared on eg Instagram .

Be yourself

Your business was created by you. You want it to come across in a way which is trustworthy and authentic. You might want it to appear professional or you might want it to appear fun, but you should always be yourself on video. Too stiff and formal and you will turn people off.

But however informal your video, it is important to prepare what you’re going to say and say it well, but it shouldn’t sound like you are reading from a script.

Relax, make eye contact and smile, just as you would if you were meeting a customer in real life. You might be speaking to thousands of people, but a good video message should feel personal and create rapport.

Great for SEO

Think SEO is all about words? Think again! Video is fantastic for SEO.

Having a video on your site can increase the amount of time a visitor spends there. This is known as dwell time and it is believed to help with Google ranking.

Research by Forrester found it is 53 times easier to get video content on page one of Google than any other content type.

Use for the top of your sales funnel

Video marketing is ideal for getting people interested in your brand or products at the top of your sales funnel.

One top of funnel strategy becoming increasingly popular with B2B marketers is the video sales letter. The way to do this is record a video looking at the problems or jobs your target audience has, then showing how your technique/ product/ service can make them better.

Sharing the video sales letter on your website and social media, as well as by email, means it can be seen by potentially thousands of people. Anyone who watches the full video and then clicks your CTA is ready to move through your sales funnel and genuinely interested in buying from you.

Getting started videos

Video marketing doesn’t stop at the top of the sales funnel. It offers some real advantages further down the funnel too.

Video is the ideal medium for introducing and demonstrating products to new audiences, either on your website or over social media. It can help persuade sceptical visitors that a product or service really does do all the things you promise it can.

By showing customers or potential customers a video that talks them through the initial getting started process, you can remove any friction or frustration which may prevent them from making a purchase or from making the best of your product.

Helpdesk videos

Common helpdesk solutions can be videoed and shared with any users experiencing difficulties - saving your customer service staff’s time and making the solutions easier to follow and understand for users.

Video lets you educate and train users on common problems without anyone being there in person, and the material can be used over and over again.

This is especially useful for B2B services, which can be complex for new users.

Story videos

People are often interested in the backstory of a business or product, and video is a great way to tell that story.

Talk about your inspirations, introduce the team, even show a few things which went wrong along your journey to bring your business to life and make it something visitors can relate to.

Use email

Video email is particularly helpful for B2B email marketing. Importantly, according to Sendspark, video emails have 43% higher open rates than standard emails, and video thumbnails get 65% more clicks than other media in emails.

They are a great way to introduce yourself and your business to potential customers. You can use the video for multiple contacts, but it still feels personal, especially if you personalise the email text.

You can also use email to nurture leads (as part of a drip campaign) with existing video content, such as webinars, customer testimonials and Q&As.

Use LinkedIn

Around 75 million senior B2B decision-makers are LinkedIn users, which makes LinkedIn an essential part of effective B2B marketing, and video plays a key part in that.

LinkedIn posts containing video generate 98% more engagement than non-video posts. The platform gives priority to ‘native video’ – content you’ve uploaded direct to LinkedIn, rather than embedded links.

Personalised videos

For high-end consumer goods or big B2B contracts, it is worth spending the time on creating a personalised video aimed specifically at that customer or potential customer.

These videos really make your customer feel valued and can give you the edge over a competitor.

(You can always edit pre-existing content into your personalised video to save some time and money.)

Shoppable links

If you are using video to advertise your products on social media, make it even easier to buy with shoppable links. People can purchase your products directly from the video without going through your website – they just click and buy straight from your social media.

Include a CTA

As with all the other tools in your sales funnel, it is essential to include a call-to-action (CTA) in your video. There’s no point investing time and money in a great video for people to enjoy, if you don’t remind them of what you want them to do next.

A CTA can either be spoken or an on-screen caption.

Webinars

Webinars are a great way to show that you know your stuff and demonstrate the solutions you can provide, while also collecting visitors’ contact details.

If you record the webinar and host it on your site behind a registration form it makes an excellent evergreen lead magnet.

Video testimonials

Customer reviews are always powerful for potential customers, but video testimonials are even more convincing. Seeing a real person talk about their experience with your product, service or brand has real impact on a viewer.

There is no doubt that using video is essential for engaging visitors and ultimately transforming your website into a sales superstar. Video offers so many benefits from improved Google rankings to longer dwell times and improved engagement with your audience. If you aren’t using it yet, you are missing out!

As we have shown, there are many ways of using video and it is important to work out what works best for your brand, your products or services and especially your audience. Whether your brand is completely new to video or you are working to improve your video offer, it is important to track what works and what doesn’t.

Do social media shopping links work well or do people turn off your YouTube videos before they get to your key message? Focus on doing more of what works well and improving or getting rid of the areas which don’t, and see what a difference video can make to your sales.

Part 4: 20 funnel and drip campaign tips to turn your website into a sales superstar

Fri, 21 Jan 2022 11:30:39 GMT

Converting website visitors into sales isn’t easy, but it isn’t impossible either! There are plenty of steps you can take to improve the likelihood of visitors to your site going on to become paying customers.

Two very useful tools, which work hand-in-hand with each other, are sales funnels and drip campaigns. In turn, they also work very closely with things like landing pages and lead magnets, which we have already covered elsewhere on this blog.

Here, we will talk about what sales funnels and drip campaigns are and give you lots of tips to really make the best of them.

Sales funnels

A sales funnel is the process a potential customer goes through as they move from a first-time visitor to your website to becoming a paying client or customer.

It is described as a funnel because it is wider at the top, as it starts with a more general audience and narrows as visitors move from one stage to the next. At each stage, those who aren’t a good fit with your business, products or services will drop out, until you are left with paying customers at the bottom of the funnel.

The stages of a funnel are given various names, but perhaps the most straightforward has four distinct stages:

• Awareness – when a prospect interacts with your business/ visits your website for the first time

• Interest – a visitor starts to consider whether your product or service is right for them

• Decision – a prospective customer knows they are going to buy, but is still likely to be considering more than one option

• Action – the end of the sales funnel, where a person takes action and buys from you

These stages sum up the mindset of a visitor on their journey to becoming a customer.

To make sure your sales funnel works really effectively, there are different tips to follow for every stage.

Awareness stage

People won’t buy from you if they don’t know you exist or if they don’t trust you. So you need to put some work into getting your name and your products or services out there and establishing your business as one which is trustworthy.

1 Blogging – blog about subjects related to your product or industry, particularly if you are in a niche sector. Work on your SEO and, over time, your blog will come up organically in searches – showing that your business is one which knows what it is talking about!

2 Social media – aim for a presence on (at least) the two or three most relevant social media networks for your product, industry and audience.
Your audience will probably want to find out more about your business and be able to ask questions on Twitter and/ or Facebook. They might want to see your products in their best light on Instagram, want to find out more about how to use them through YouTube or to see people having fun with them on TikTok.

Be active and responsive to comments and questions to help grow your social media following.

3 PPC advertising – Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising is undoubtedly one of the best ways to increase awareness of your business, and it can prove to be very cost-effective. Google Ads and Facebook Ads are the most popular, and usually the most effective, but your target audience may respond better to advertising on Instagram or TikTok.

Interest stage

When someone moves through the funnel to the interest stage, they want to know whether your product or service will meet their needs. You have got their attention, but they’re not ready to buy. Now you need to prove to them why your product is right for them.

Make sure your actions at this stage highlight your brand’s unique selling point (USP).

4 Lead magnets – offer a lead magnet in exchange for an email address. A lead magnet should be instantly accessible and could be anything a potential customer would find valuable – from an ebook to a cheat sheet, exclusive video content or access to a webinar.

5 Landing pages – your actions in the awareness stage of the funnel should drive visitors to your website to find out more. While they could head straight for your homepage, a landing page is more valuable.

A landing page is a single page, with a simple, clear message to encourage your visitor to take an action – usually providing their contact details (possibly in return for a lead magnet), rather than pushing for a sale, as they are still quite low in the sales funnel.

Decision stage

At this stage of the funnel, a prospective customer knows they are going to buy, but they still aren’t certain whether they will buy from you. They are most likely considering a range of factors, including price, quality and sustainability, before making their final decision.

6 Drip campaign – we go into much more detail on this below, but if you’ve got a contact’s email address, this would be a good time to start an email drip campaign to help them get to know your business and your products better.

7 Offer free delivery and returns – free delivery and returns are always an attractive option, if you can afford to offer them. If everything else you are offering is equal to a competitor, free delivery and returns can give your business the edge.

Action stage

At this stage of the funnel, the customer has decided they are going to buy from you! So make it as easy as possible for them. Actions you take now will increase the likelihood of them going on to become a valuable repeat customer.

8 Offer Live Chat – with so many customers abandoning a purchase during checkout, offering Live Chat can help deal with any last minute questions or concerns they have, increasing the chance of them completing their purchase.

9 Optimise your sales funnel – your sales funnel might be working, but could it work better? It is always possible to optimise and improve it. Pay particular attention to the places where people move from one stage of the funnel to the next.

Areas to focus on include:

• Your content – what brings people into the funnel and what doesn’t?
• Your ads – could you run more, could you target them differently, could you advertise somewhere extra or different?
• A/B test and optimise your landing pages – including headlines, images, text and CTA.

Drip campaigns

A drip campaign is a series of emails, which you send out to a section of your subscriber list over a period of time – for example for six consecutive Fridays.

A drip campaign can be a very useful part of your sales funnel. Its aim is to build towards something rather than to sell immediately. You are nurturing your contacts towards taking an action you would like them to take.
Your drip campaign could focus on anything from welcoming someone as a new follower to encouraging them to buy your new product as soon as it launches - by building up excitement for that product over the course of several weeks.

To really get the benefit of a drip campaign, you should be running several drip campaigns at a time (maybe as many as 10) to different sections of your audience or to prospects at different stages of your sales funnel. When new subscribers sign up to your email list, they can simply be added to an existing drip campaign.

Here’s some tips to start a drip campaign or improve on existing ones…

10 Identify your audience – to make your drip campaign work as well as possible, you need to target your audience effectively. If you are running campaigns for a number of different products or services, make sure every member of your audience receives the campaign which best meets their needs.

Consider the issues they are trying to resolve, the goals they are trying to achieve, the best way to get their attention with an email and what action you hope they will take after reading your email.

Your audience should also receive different campaigns, depending if they are brand new subscribers, lapsed customers or regular customers.

11 Identify the goal for your campaign – every drip campaign you send out should have a clear goal. Goals could include:

• Increasing brand awareness
• Getting customer feedback
• Promoting a new product or service
• Increasing registrations for a future event
• Increasing sales

These goals need to be closely aligned to your audience.

12 Use different emails at different times – a drip campaign can be used for many situations. Some common ones include:

• Welcome – thank them for signing up, then follow this with eg a discount code or some tips.
• Nurturing – for someone who has been signed up for a few weeks or months, but hasn’t yet made a purchase, offer them a lead magnet, then follow up with a discount code.
• Renewals – for subscriptions or memberships that are about to expire, send friendly reminders of the need to renew in the weeks before the membership expires, ending with an urgent reminder to renew on the final day.
• Reminder emails – for upcoming events from webinars to gigs or exhibitions, get your leads excited about the event by drip feeding exclusive teasers about what they have to look forward to on the day.
• Launch emails – in the weeks leading up to a big product launch, get your subscribers excited with exclusive behind-the-scenes information and photos.
• Milestone emails – from a customer’s birthday to the anniversary of them first subscribing, mark the event with a celebratory personalised email to thank them for being a subscriber or customer.
• Abandoned shopping baskets – if someone has put products in their online basket, but hasn’t checked out, a friendly reminder may be all they need to go back and complete the purchase.

13 Automate your emails – you don’t need to physically send out your emails yourself every week. Use a sales automation tool which allows you to create, schedule and send drip campaign emails to different segments of your email list.

14 Keep it brief – A drip campaign shouldn’t last indefinitely. It is a time-limited campaign over the course of a few weeks.

Depending on your goals, you should aim to complete your drip campaign within four to 10 emails – usually by sending one email a week.

15 Use great headlines – it is likely that your email is landing in a very full inbox, so it needs to stand out from the crowd. Make sure your subject line lets your reader know straightaway that you are going to answer a question, solve a problem or offer them something they don’t want to miss out on.

16 Create and personalise your content – you don’t want your emails to be boring, so keep the paragraphs short and focus on the quality. Check for inconsistencies, bad grammar or typos before hitting ‘send’.

Personalise your content by sending it to the relevant segments of your email list.

Most importantly, check that every email offers something of value which will make your subscribers happy that they have read all the way to the end.

17 Include a CTA at the end of every email – your drip campaign is geared towards getting somebody to take an action – so make it clear what that action is! Include a call-to-action (CTA) at the end of every email.

Your CTA could be for a lead magnet, a prize draw, a discount or to check out your new product range. (But don’t ask people to buy too often, you’re trying to build a relationship, not going for the hard sell!)

18 Prepare all your emails in one go – your emails might be sent out once a week, but they should be a consistent sequence. The best way to make sure you don’t promise something and fail to deliver it, is by writing all of your emails for a single drip campaign at the same time.

19 Test your drip campaign – to get the most out of your drip campaign, testing should be an ongoing process.
A/B test the content of your emails (headline, copy, CTA etc), as well as the day of the week and the time of the day you send them out.

Remember to only test one element at a time. That way, you will be able to easily see if there are any simple changes you can make, which will impact your open rates and the number of actions taken.

20 Know how it will end – your drip campaign might be six or 10 emails long, but sometimes people will need to come out of the campaign before it has ended. If your campaign is working towards getting someone to sign up for an event and they sign up after your third email, don’t send a fourth, fifth and sixth email still encouraging them to sign up. That would create a poor customer experience and undo all your good work to date.

So set up a trigger which will remove people from the campaign list as soon as they take your desired action.

A good sales funnel and effective drip campaigns can really help to turn your website into a sales superstar. But the key is not to rush things.

You want to show your brand, products and services to your audience and you want them to buy from you. But you don’t want to push the hard sell. Try too hard, too early and you will turn your audience away long before they have made a purchase.

Take time to build your sales funnel and cultivate your drip campaigns. Keep testing and optimising, and show your audience why your brand really can meet their needs. By following these tips, you will increase your conversion rates, stay ahead in a competitive market and ultimately increase your sales.

Part 3: 14 landing page tips to turn your website into a sales superstar

Tue, 21 Dec 2021 10:08:52 GMT

Converting website visits into sales isn’t an easy process, but there are ways to increase the likelihood of visitors going on to convert. One of the best ways of doing it is through improving your landing pages.

A landing page should be a well thought out and carefully crafted page. It receives traffic from your advertising, marketing and social media campaigns, with the aim of those visitors going on to covert - this could be a sale, a sign-up or a lead.

It is important to remember that a landing page is NOT a homepage. The point of your homepage is that visitors should want to go from there to explore your site, but a landing page has only one aim - for your visitors to click, share their details and convert.

The conversion rates for landing pages vary between different industries. The conversion rate for an ‘average' landing page is between two and four per cent, but it’s best to focus on doing better than the average for your own industry, rather than the overall average.

The key figures are your own - if your landing page can convert more today than it was doing last month or last year, you are heading in the right direction.

If you are not sure what your conversion rate is, it is the number of people who convert into leads or sales, divided by the total number of visitors to your page.

So if your landing page has 2,000 visitors in a month and makes 100 sales from that page, the conversion rate would be 100 divided by 2,000, which is 0.05 - or 5%.

If you follow these tips, your landing pages can help turn your website into a sales superstar.

1. Target the right audience

Before creating or changing you landing pages, it’s important that you understand who is going to be landing on them and what they will react to.

Ask yourself:

• Who will visit this page?
• What do I want them to see?
• How do I want them to feel?
• What do I want them do?

2. Know your own goals

It’s important to focus on just one clear goal with each of your landing pages, so that users can see exactly what they need to do and don’t get confused or sidetracked.

3. Write compelling headlines

You need to grab your visitors’ attention straightaway, so use a straightforward and compelling headline they can’t ignore. Focus on emotions or solutions to problems to really attract attention.

4. Get your copy right
Your copy needs to get to the point and be convincing and genuine. Most importantly, it needs to understand a visitor’s problem and provide them with a solution.

Consider your audience, what their problem might be and how you can solve that problem. Importantly, think about how you can convince them to take the action which is the first step towards solving that problem.

5. Make sure your CTAs work
Your call-to-action (CTA) is what will convert someone from a visitor to a customer. It is the most important part of your landing page, so it must be effective.

Everything about your CTA needs to be right, to maximise the chances of a visitor taking action.

The message really needs to get across the importance of the CTA and could convey a sense of urgency. Don’t use dreary words like ‘Submit’, make them actionable like ‘Shop now’ or even ‘Yes, please!’.

Make sure the colour is easy to see and stands out sufficiently from the rest of the page. The size of the button needs to be big enough that a visitor can’t miss it, but not so big that it dominates the page and becomes overwhelming.

Your CTA should be ‘above the fold’, which means it should be visible on a screen (including a mobile device) without someone needing to scroll down to find it.

6. Minimise scrolling

As soon as a person arrives on your landing page, they need to see your key message. Without scrolling, they need to know how your product or service will benefit them.

The clearer and more visible the benefit is, the more likely they are to convert.

If you want to add additional information about your company, that can go ‘below the fold’, for people who want to scroll to find out more. But it is important not to clutter your page with too much information and to keep your key message as clear as possible.

7. Use the best images

Images can really enhance your message and encourage visitors to take action (or not!). Keep them simple and striking and make sure they are in keeping with your content, to ensure your message and your CTA really stand out.

8. Get your forms right

Once a visitor has clicked on your CTA button, they will be taken to a form to fill in their essential details. This could still be make-or-break as to whether they go on to convert.

The whole purpose of your landing page is to get these contact details, so make sure your form appears both trustworthy and easy to use.
Generally speaking, the less information you ask for, the higher your conversion rate will be. So the best way is just to ask for an email address and not to go into further detail.

9. Use video

One of the most effective ways to engage users on your landing pages (particularly for younger generations) is by adding relevant videos to really strengthen your message.

Videos makes your page more compelling, but they don’t need to be complicated. While every landing page will need a different video, they only need to be very short and should take a minimum of work and editing to produce.

10. Add trust signals

If a visitor has arrived on your site for the first time, how do they know they can trust your business to provide them with the products or services they need?

While it’s important not to have too many distractions on a landing page, a couple of user reviews/ testimonials near your CTA button, as well as secure payment badges, any award logos or customer logos will all provide reassurance that your business can be trusted.

12. Fast loading times

One of the biggest mistakes you can make for any web page, including a landing page, is a slow loading time. You could have the best headline, copy, CTA and images, but if your landing page doesn’t load within a few seconds, your visitors will leave.

13. Use live chat

People are more likely to take action if they know their concerns and questions are being heard and responded to. Using a live chat tool not only answers those questions, but it shows you care about your audience and is an extra way to make a good impression on them.

14. A/B test your pages

To be certain that you are really maximising the opportunities from your landing page, it is essential to A/B test them - by testing each element of a page in isolation.

Without A/B testing, you won’t know exactly what it is which makes your audience take action. While your landing pages might already be doing a good job, with testing it is possible to optimise them to do an even better job and encourage more people to convert.

It is essential that you only test one element at a time eg the wording of your copy, the placement of your CTA or the colour of your font, so that you can be sure which elements are having an impact.

Landing pages are a really good tool for increasing conversions and sales on your website. While it’s unlikely that you will get them right first time, by following these actions you can make your landing pages really work for your business and turn your website into a sales superstar.

Part 2: 22 lead magnet tips to turn your website into a sales superstar

Tue, 07 Dec 2021 11:45:20 GMT

Converting website visits into sales isn’t an easy process, but there are ways to increase the likelihood of visitors going on to convert. One of the best ways of doing that is through lead magnets.

Lead magnets are something free, which visitors would find valuable, and are offered in return for an email address. They help you start to build a relationship with website visitors before they have even decided to buy from you.

They are a great way to start engaging with customers and potential customers, and show that you care about them, which builds trust in your brand and product or service.

Lead magnets take many forms (we will talk about some of them below). Select the ones which will work for your business, your industry and, most importantly, your customers.

Whatever your industry, product or service, lead magnets should share these characteristics:

· They need to solve a problem

· They should be specific, simple and valuable to a visitor

· They must fulfil the promise you make about them

· They should relate directly to your business and what it has to offer

· They should be instantly accessible – preferably available to download immediately

1. Know your audience

For your prospective customers to take action and sign up for your lead magnet, it needs to be relevant to them. The more you know about your audience and the problems and issues they want solving, as well as what motivates them to take action, the easier it will be to create a lead magnet that works for them.

Most businesses will be trying to reach more than one demographic and will also be trying to target people at different stages on their customer journey – whether that is the first time they’ve visited your website or a returning customer. So one size won’t fit all for your lead magnet!

2. Repackage your best performing content

The chances are that you’ve already got the perfect content for a lead magnet on your blog, or maybe one of your videos. Go through your existing content and find out what is already performing well for you.

Then repackage it into something new – like an ebook, downloadable checklist or template – and you’ve created a lead magnet which visitors to your site will be happy to give their email address for.

3. Test your lead magnets

A/B testing (comparing one version to another) is essential to make sure a lead magnet is going to work as well as possible for you. Even when it is bringing significant traffic and conversions to your site, you can’t be sure that you have created the very best version of your lead magnet.

Some things to test include:

· Does seeing an image of the lead magnet on a sign-up page (or pop-up) encourage more people to convert than just seeing the title?

· Do more people sign up from a pop-up or from a link on your site?

· Which sort of lead magnet gets the most sign-ups?

You should also test the design and useability of your sign-up forms.

4. Good design

It’s likely that your lead magnet is based on existing content, but it has to be something better than a visitor could just find on your site.

One way to make it appear more valuable to users is through good design.

If you don’t have an in-house designer, a tool like Canva has a huge range of templates that you can customise, whether you are creating a downloadable checklist, an ebook, a case study or something else.

5. Give it a great name

Your lead magnet might be full of incredibly valuable content and it might look fantastic, but without a great name, most people will ignore it.

The title should be something which very few of your visitors will be able to refuse. It really needs to highlight the benefits and sell them a solution to a problem.

Something like: 15 ways your accountant can make your life better or Easy 10 point house sale checklist could be exactly what your visitors are looking for and help build a relationship with them which could eventually lead to a sale.

6. Update regularly

Depending on the type of lead magnet you produce, it may need updating every six months to a year. Many industries move quickly and advice could soon become outdated, plus you don’t want your visitors to keep getting the same offers every time they visit your site.

If you created an ebook focused on advice for 2021, edit it, update it and repackage it ready for 2022.

So what sort of lead magnet should you create? Here’s a few ideas of lead magnets that work. Remember that you can create them for a number of different subjects, so if, for example, checklists work well for you, keep creating them!

7. Checklist

Instructional blog posts make the ideal basis for a checklist. Simplify your post into a series of bullet points or numbered steps (making sure to remove any points which aren’t actionable).

Offer your checklist in printable form, so that users can actually print it off and physically tick the actions off as they achieve them.

8. Template

Templates make very popular lead magnets because they are so useful. They help people save time because they can just adapt the template for their own purposes and don’t need to create and design something new.

Every industry will have their own ideas for templates which their audience would find useful, but some of the most popular are: emails; spreadsheets; social media; and graphic designs.

9. Cheat sheet

Cheat sheets are very similar to checklists, but they give the user a list of guidelines or a process that they can follow to achieve a specific aim or benefit.

Users like them because cheat sheets save them from having to work something out for themselves!

10. Resource list

As an expert in your own niche or industry, you will know a lot more about your subject than your website visitors. A resource list collects the best resources together into one easy package for users, to save them having to look it all up themselves and also stops them relying on inaccurate or out-of-date information.

Your resource list will ideally be a mix of your own content with content from other authoritative sources.

11. Gated content

Gated content is valuable additional information, which is part of a blog post. For example, a visitor might get to read 10 tips on your blog, but by giving you their email address they get access to an extra 10 tips.

12. Tutorial

A tutorial could be a video or a PDF, but it should teach someone how to do something new or differently.

Getting the headline right is key to getting people to sign up for a tutorial – they want to know what they are going to learn and in how many steps eg 15 steps to financial independence.

13. Webinar

Webinars have become increasingly popular since Covid. They are a great way to learn something new and valuable, without leaving the comfort of your own home or office.

Create urgency with a live event or offer a recording of the webinar for a limited period of time.

14. Ebook

Ebooks are one of the most popular forms of lead magnet. With a great title and great content, they can prove very valuable to users.

But as they are longer than things like checklists and cheat sheets, it is important that you are providing information that users would find helpful, so that they will take the time to actually read what you have to offer.

15. Report

Reports are particularly good lead magnets for B2B companies.

You can either pull together a report from your own surveys and research, or create a comprehensive report from data from a number of sources. Whichever way you do it, your report needs to be interesting, valuable and give an updated story or insights which aren’t readily available elsewhere.

16. Case study

The chances are that your services or products have made a difference to lots of people. Would any of them be willing to share their story?

A written or video case story from a satisfied customer is like a more in-depth online review. It is an opportunity for a real person to share with others what their initial problem was and how your service or product helped them.

17. Quiz

Few people can resist joining a short online quiz. The best quizzes should be fun and lighthearted, even for fairly ‘serious’ businesses. It could be a straightforward multiple choice quiz with right or wrong answers, or it could be one which reveals something like a personality type or something fun like which Harry Potter house you would be in or which breed of cat you would be.

18. Access to a private group

You are an expert at what you do, and you could share that expertise with others through a private group on Facebook or LinkedIn. Rather than just open it up to everyone, offer access to the group as a lead magnet.

19. Free trial

Get visitors more interested in your product or service by giving them a free trial or demo in return for an email address. For businesses like estate agents or car sales, you could offer them a shortened form of a valuation report.

20. Exclusive video

Video is a very popular form of content – they are easy to consume any time, anywhere and are a great way to learn. So exclusive video content makes an excellent lead magnet.

Effective examples include: a demo, training video or ‘how to’ (to use a particular product effectively or learn a new skill); an announcement of a new product or service; case studies; or an excerpt from a webinar.

21. Online demo

Similar to video, online demos are very helpful if you have any products or software which could be difficult to use.

If you have the budget, you could even offer exclusive one-to-one online demos, giving users a chance to ask questions as they learn from your demo. It works both ways, as this will give your business a real insight into prospective customers, what their problems are and how you can help to solve them.

22. Audio

Podcasts have grown hugely in popularity in recent years. So while you might not actually offer a podcast as a lead magnet, you can tap into the growing trend for people listening for both information and entertainment.

Audio content is helpful because people can listen while doing other things, such as driving, housework or exercising.

If you’ve already got great video content, you can even repackage it as an audio lead magnet!

Lead magnets are a helpful and powerful tool to build relationships and ultimately increase sales. They allow you to get to know your customers and to build trust and credibility.

They come in many different forms and are usually fairly simple to create. With so much choice, it should be easy to find the right lead magnets which will really work for your business and help turn your website into a sales superstar.

Part 1: 15 ways pop-ups will turn your website into a sales superstar

Tue, 07 Dec 2021 10:52:08 GMT

Pop-ups on websites sometimes have a bad reputation. We’ve all known them to appear at just the wrong time and block out the site we’re trying to look at. But times have changed and this reputation is no longer deserved. In fact, pop-ups can work very well and increase sales, when businesses use them correctly.

The average pop-up conversion rate in 2020 was 3.09%, according to Popupsmart. This compares very favourably with email conversion rates, which range from 0.31% to 4% (depending on the industry), according to Klaviyo.

The key to pop-ups which work is:

· Don’t block a page completely

· Only share information which is relevant

· Make sure they appear at the right time

· Provide a powerful call-to-action (CTA)

How can pop-ups turn your website into a sales superstar?

1. Segment your audience

Your website visitors will vary in terms of age, gender, geographical location and interests. So don’t use the same message for everyone, because it won’t work for a large part of your audience.

One easy way to segment your audience is through traffic source – for example a first time visitor from social media would benefit from a different message to an existing customer from your email list.

2. Give helpful information

Pop-ups which are just about the hard sell can be very off-putting. So even though the ultimate aim is to make sales, start out by giving your visitors helpful information.

If you give your visitors relevant and useful information related to your niche, they will see your website as a credible and reliable source and are more likely to return in the future.

3. Remind customers to complete their purchases

Visitors abandon their online shopping baskets for many reasons. Sometimes they literally just get distracted and forget what they are doing! As they have already shown an interest in your products or services, they are likely to come back at some point.

Use a pop-up to remind them what they already have in their baskets and encourage them to complete their purchases.

4. Understand geographical differences

Whether your business is very local or multinational, there will be differences between what people want to see from you, based on the different countries, regions, counties or towns where they live.

A well-timed pop-up is a great way to provide a quick, customised message to your audience, which is relevant to their location.

5. Highlight special offers

It’s easy for your visitors to miss special offers on your website, especially if you have a big product range.

A pop-up can be used to draw attention to your latest promotions, making them much harder to miss.

6. Recommend products

Whether they are bestsellers or products related to something a visitor has just put into their basket, a well-timed pop-up is a great way to recommend products.

It might be something they would have otherwise forgotten or something they have been looking at, but a visitor who is already engaged is more likely to buy a recommended product.

7. Understand geographical differences

Whether your business is very local or multinational, there will be differences between what people want to see from you, based on the different countries, regions, counties or towns where they live.

A well-timed pop-up is a great way to provide a quick, customised message to your audience, which is relevant to their location.

8. Highlight special offers

It’s easy for your visitors to miss special offers on your website, especially if you have a big product range.

A pop-up can be used to draw attention to your latest promotions, making them much harder to miss.

9. Recommend products

Whether they are bestsellers or products related to something a visitor has just put into their basket, a well-timed pop-up is a great way to recommend products.

It might be something they would have otherwise forgotten or something they have been looking at, but a visitor who is already engaged is more likely to buy a recommended product.

10. Encourage visitors to stick around

An exit-intent pop-up comes up when a visitor is about to leave your site. It is a final chance to grab their attention – so use the pop-up to offer something they would find it hard to refuse, such as an exclusive discount, free delivery or a free trial.

11. Provide delivery information

Delivery costs and times are often a deal-breaker when it comes to online shopping. People may abandon their baskets to check on the delivery detail and not return. Make sure they can’t miss the answers they need with a pop-up at just the right time.

12. Collect feedback

A pop-up is a great way of collecting customer feedback. It not only helps you to make improvements to your brand, your products and your customer service, but it also shows customers that you value what they think.

Customers who feel that your business cares about them are more likely to return in future.

13. Sign up for reminders

This sort of pop-up is particularly useful for when a product is out of stock. Rather than risk losing a customer completely, use a pop-up to collect their details so that you can email to let them know when the product is back in stock.

This saves them the hassle of looking elsewhere and helps you hang onto a valuable customer.

14. Create urgency

Many customers find it hard to resist an offer that is coming to an end or a product which is going out of stock.

Use a pop-up which says something like: Buy now! Offer expires at midnight to create urgency and encourage visitors to buy before they miss out.

15. Offer chat support

Websites and product ranges can sometimes appear overwhelming. A visitor might just need a little bit of help to point them in the direction of what they are looking for – whether a particular product, delivery information or something else.

A pop-up chat box will show visitors that your business values them and is happy to help them, which builds trust.

Times have changed since the frustrating pop-ups which blocked entire screens. Now pop-ups can provide the help your visitors need at just the right time. They can build trust, improve engagement and increase sales and conversions.

Pop-ups really can help turn your website into a sales superstar!

Marketing to different generations

Fri, 26 Nov 2021 13:22:12 GMT

As business owners, we all know it’s hard to acquire customers and hold onto them. We can get their attention through our website, email marketing, social media marketing and more. But what works for a 20-year-old won’t work for a 60-year-old. So it’s important to be aware of who you are marketing to and the best way of reaching them.

In the past, companies might have advertised to ‘adults aged 18-49’, but the interests, priorities and needs of a 19-year-old man are very different from those of a 48-year-old woman. The reality of business in the 21 ^st century is that a one-size-fits-all approach to marketing doesn’t work.

And if your business caters for a large demographic, you will need to target your marketing differently for the different generations within that demographic.

The four main generations in the UK today are:

· Baby Boomers (1946-64)

· Generation X (1965-80)

· Millennials (1981-96)

· Generation Z (1997-2012)

Most businesses will target at least two of these generations eg Baby Boomers and Gen X or Gen X and Millennials. Learning as much as you can about the generations will help you to develop a marketing strategy which really resonates with each distinct group.

Remember:

· Use audience insights to target each generation effectively

· Reaching each generation requires different messaging and media

· Learn to adapt your message for each generation in a way that works for them

· Each generation has grown up with different technology – from complete digital natives (Gen Z) to the typewriter and landline generation (Boomers)

Baby Boomers

Either retired or heading for retirement, the Baby Boomers have seen their families grow up, paid off their mortgages and are looking to enjoy life.

While they don’t appreciate a hard sell from advertisers, they also don’t like feeling overlooked by companies in favour of Millennials. To ignore Boomers is a big mistake – they often have far more disposable income than the younger generations. This generation is responsible for 51% of the UK’s total wealth and likes to spend money on quality products.

And with all that disposable income, they are often susceptible to an upsell – as long as it is offered politely by someone they feel they can trust.

While they have gradually embraced technology and even social media (they are big Facebook users!), Baby Boomers are generally more comfortable with traditional forms of marketing and customer service.

Facebook is something for keeping up with friends and their grandchildren, and they don’t adverts interrupting that experience. In marketing, they don’t like anything which intrudes on their lives and are far more likely to respond to an email than to any form of instant messaging. They still appreciate a newspaper or TV ad more than other forms of advertising.

The Boomers use the internet mainly for finding information or researching brands. They are most comfortable with text messaging and basic apps on their smartphones. Needless to say, they are the generation least likely to buy straight from their smartphones. But ensuring a checkout process is easy enough for an older person to use is always a good idea.

They are often very loyal to their favourite brands, which they may have been using for 50 years or more. To persuade them to try a new brand, you need to share clear and honest descriptions of how a product or service can benefit them. They also want to read honest reviews to back that up.

The Boomers like to talk to real people either in-store or on the end of a phone and don’t like companies which don’t have easily accessible phone numbers. If they do use social media, they want to hear back that their feedback has been passed on to the right team. By focusing on their priorities, your business could really benefit from the Boomers’ prosperity.

Generation X

At the height of their careers, Generation X are often paying big mortgages, while juggling the demands of teenage and adult children with ageing parents. Typically, they will be family-oriented, financially responsible and financially independent, with a significant influence on the workplace and the economy.

Despite this, they are a forgotten generation, sandwiched between the Millennials and the Boomers, and sharing attributes with both. Generation X often have big purchasing power, so it is important for businesses not to ignore them.

Generation X grew up without online shopping, but most are happy to embrace both shopping online and shopping in-store. Older Gen X-ers may still struggle a bit with technology, but the younger members of the generation are usually as enthusiastic and savvy as the Millennials.

They’ve seen a lot of advertising, marketing and sales tactics over the years and aren’t easy to fool. They want to buy from businesses which they see as honest and authentic. That’s why Generation X are particularly big users of online reviews. Like the Boomers, they still digest TV and newspaper ads, but will then go and check a company’s credentials online before buying.

And if someone posts a review of your product, take the time to reply and say thank you. A bit of politeness and good customer service is always appreciated by this generation!

Generation X are big Facebook users, so make sure your business details are up-to-date and accurate on Facebook, as well as review sites like Trip Advisor. To reach this generation, post regular organic content on Facebook, use Facebook advertising and use the ‘Shop now’ button, so that people can buy straight from social media.

They are constantly checking their emails because they work a lot – so email marketing is more effective for this generation than any other.

Once they’ve found a brand or product they like, Generation X are loyal customers who will keep coming back for me, so it’s worth putting the effort into marketing to them. As they share traits of both Baby Boomers and Millennials, Generation X respond best to a combination of forms of marketing to drive them to your website – from social media and email to TV and newspaper advertising.

Millennials

Millennials are no longer the young adults many still assume they are. While some are fairly recent graduates, others are turning 40 and have families of their own. Some are already rising to senior positions in the workplace, but they are also a big generation of entrepreneurs, who understand that jobs aren’t always for life and you have to make your own destiny.

They are far less likely to shop in-store than older generations. They want to shop quickly and easily straight from their phones – and for things to arrive as quickly as possible. Convenience is key for this generation – from Amazon Prime to Deliveroo and Uber.

Millennials often decide where to eat and what clothes to buy based on what they see on Instagram. They are generally suspicious of traditional advertising and marketing and often won’t buy anything or make a decision without discussing it with friends and family, as well as checking online reviews. They also respond well to influencers and brand ambassadors (as long as they are authentic and really match your brand values), as they can relate to them and see them as more ‘real’ than straight advertising.

Millennials are the most likely to buy after seeing something on social media - whether that is through an ad, a video or a product review. They are the only generation who favour social media over email for customer service enquiries and feedback.

This generation is particularly interested in products which are sustainable and ethical, so make sure those credentials are visible across your website and social media. But make sure they are honest too! Millennials won’t buy from companies with fake green credentials. If your packaging looks great and is sustainable, expect Millennials to take a photo and put it on their Instagram Stories. On the flipside, they may also do this if your packaging is the opposite of sustainable.

Millennials are far less likely to read marketing emails than the older generations. They want informative and easy-to-digest content which helps them to really understand your products and their benefits – video always works well.

To appeal to Millennials, it’s important to provide great customer service to encourage great reviews – on social media, review sites and your own website.

While it’s not always easy to win over the Millennials, it is worth the effort to engage with them on social media in particular, as they are likely to then refer a business to their own social media following – largely made up of fellow savvy Millennials.

As this generation approach the peak of their careers and earning potential, it is well worth investing in marketing to them and holding onto them as customers in the longer term.

Generation Z

Generation Z are the first generation to grow up in an entirely digital world. They range from children at the top end of primary school, through teenagers and students to young working adults.

As they enter the workplace, Generation Z’s earning power and buying power will increase. And for those still too young to earn their own money, they have great influence over their parents’ buying power. So it is important not to ignore this young generation.

Gen Z have an attention span of just eight seconds and can seamlessly juggle up to five devices at once, including smartphone, tablet, laptop, games console and TV.

Generation Z share their opinions on everything, good or bad, on social media. Their preferred channels are Snapchat, TikTok and Instagram – which is where many of them look for and find new products. They consume, share and join in with viral trends across these platforms.

If you want to reach this generation, make your products ‘Instagrammable’ and Generation Z will not only buy them, but will also share them with their followers.

When Gen Z are your target market, focus on interactive viral content or create an online game. Many members of this generation are unable to resist an online viral challenge.

Instagram Stories, as well as short video ads across YouTube, Snapchat and TikTok, are the best ways to connect with this generation. Yet only around a fraction of businesses are using TikTok in their marketing.

Although they spend more time on social media than the other generations, they are the least likely to follow brands. So working with YouTube and TikTok creators and influencers in your niche is essential to connect with Generation Z. They relate far more to this new generation of celebrities than they do to traditional celebrities from TV, film, music or sport. Another advantage of working with micro-influencers in your niche is that they are usually a lot more cost-effective then working with traditional celebrities.

Gen Z care about the environment, sustainability and socio-economic issues. They aren’t loyal to any particular brand, instead focusing on either a brand’s ethical credentials or the latest trends. They are challenging gender norms, so don’t respond well to marketing which is targeted specifically at one gender. But they also want to engage with brands which are lighthearted and fun. They don’t want carefully created (and expensive) content, because they spend their time on Snapchat and TikTok.

If you really focus on this generation’s needs and manage to hook a member of Gen Z in their teens, you have huge potential for sustainable business growth, as they grow up, spend more and influence their peers to do the same.

Each generation has their own experiences, expectations, values and lifestyle which influence what they buy and how they buy it. To really make the most of your marketing spend, it is essential you are sensitive to these differences and target your budget effectively at the generations you are trying to reach.

While there will never be hard and fast rules for every member of each generation, there are definitely big differences between them, and particularly between one end of the spectrum (the Boomers) and the other (Millennials and Gen Z).

Getting the mix right, particularly where you are targeting two or more generations, and adjusting your strategy to meet the expectations of each generation, will make it easier to build their trust and build your business.

Get your ecommerce site ready for Black Friday and Christmas

Fri, 15 Oct 2021 10:11:01 GMT

When Black Friday comes around in November, sometimes it can feel like the whole world has gone mad. But, love it or hate it, as an ecommerce retailer, (even a very small one), you need to be a part of it.

Thirty per cent of all retail sales take place between Black Friday and Christmas .

Black Friday is the first Friday after Thanksgiving, which us Brits can take to mean the last Friday in November. In 2021 it will take place on 26 ^th November and in 2022 it will take place on 25 ^th November.

So, there is just a month between Black Friday and Christmas Day to capitalise on nearly a third of your annual retail sales.

Is your ecommerce site up for the challenge? If it isn’t, it’s time to get it ready now.

Start early

When you’re planning ahead, it’s remarkable how quickly the time seems to go. One minute, we’re enjoying the last warmth of summer and the next minute it’s already November.

So, as soon as you can, start thinking about your Black Friday deals. Will they be sitewide? Will they be on specific products? Will you offer other incentives, such as free delivery?

The key is always to get ahead of the competition and make as many sales as you can. If you’ve got unique products, focus on those. If your competitors stock something similar to you, consider a bigger price cut, if you can afford it.

Once you’ve planned your deals, how will you let shoppers know about them? Prepare your advertising and social media posts in advance, so they are ready to go just ahead of Black Friday.

Check your site

It’s always a good idea to check your site’s speed at this early stage too. And can it cope with an increase of traffic? If your site is too slow or crashes due to extra traffic, your Black Friday won’t bring the extra sales you are hoping for.

If you don’t have the time or the skills to sort out any problems yourself, get in touch with a local company or freelancer who can help you out.

Use blog posts and video

Most ecommerce sites will have a blog alongside their sales pages. Many sites will also use video. Both blog posts and video can bring visitors to your site.

Used well, your blog or video can give visitors valuable information, which helps your business come across as one which is knowledgeable and can be trusted. Ultimately, this helps build a relationship and gives people confidence to buy from you.

You can use your blog and video to gently point visitors in the direction of your products. Digital marketing guru, Neil Patel, recommends creating something like a comparison guide. Rather than just writing about the particular product you want them to buy, you can offer them the pros and cons of a variety of similar products, so they feel like you are supporting them to make an informed decision, rather than just advertising something. Of course, you can still make your own product sound particularly good!

Get extra mileage out of this content by sharing it on social media to increase your reach and engage with your followers.

Decide which products to feature

Even if you’re offering a sitewide promotion, like 20% off all stock, it’s important to feature products which will boost sales and help your brand stand out.

Black Friday and Christmas are about increasing sales and giving your customers a bargain, but they are also about shifting the right stock at the right time! Christmas gift items look fantastic in November and December, but they lose some of their charm if you’ve still got them lying around taking up valuable space in April.

So it is particularly important to focus on any seasonal items and make sure you give them top billing on your site and through your ads and social media (whether paid, organic or both). Make full use of festive messages and imagery to make them irresistible to shoppers.

Check your product pages

You might have some great deals, but there’s a lot of competition out there and potential customers aren’t going to buy if your product pages are shoddy.

You need to check both the appearance and the functioning of your product pages.

Do your photos really capture the product fully? Does your copy really sell the its benefits? Have you got all the essential information such as size, colour and material covered?

Get someone who is less internet savvy to check that they can find all the information they need and that it is easy to select an item and add it to their basket. If there are any glitches, it’s essential to get them sorted out before Black Friday, particularly for your featured products.

Make it festive

When shoppers are in a festive mood, they are more likely to buy from a site which is also in a festive mood!

So how can you make your site more festive for Black Friday and Christmas shopping?

Make sure both your images and your copy convey your excitement for Christmas. You can keep it simple with an updated seasonal header or banner and also update any hero images and key product images. Think about the colour, the lighting and props – use red, green and gold, with the hint of fairy lights, a Christmas tree or a roaring fire in the background.

You don’t need to do it for every single product, but it’s definitely worth the extra effort for the products you are keen to sell over the festive period.

Create your own gift guide

In the run-up to Christmas, most shoppers will be doing Christmas shopping. And while some people love it and will know exactly what they want to buy, others will struggle and will need a helping hand.

You know your site and product range better than anyone. Think about your products and who they would appeal to. Do you have gifts for babies and toddlers? Teenagers? Millennials? Gardeners? Foodies?

Group your products together into gift guides which make it easy for people to shop for their teenage nephew, their elderly mother-in-law or their best friend’s new baby.

If you’ve got the right products and you’re making helpful suggestions, why would a Christmas shopper bother going elsewhere?

Personalise your email offers

Many Black Friday and Christmas shoppers will check out their emails for interesting offers before visiting an ecommerce site. An email offering 20% off is good, but it will be up against a lot of other emails offering 20% off in a person’s inbox.

So use the information you have about people on your email list to target them with offers that will really interest them. If a customer has only bought babywear from you, there’s no point in sharing your offers on women’s fashion and if they are a dog lover, there’s no need to share offers on cat gifts.

Follow up abandoned sales

According to Shopify, around 70% of online shopping baskets are abandoned before checkout. With more people shopping, the overall figure is even higher in December.

People abandon their shopping baskets for a number of reasons:

· They are using them as a sort of wishlist

· They forgot to checkout their purchases

· They stopped shopping to check prices elsewhere

· They found the checkout process too long and complicated

· They weren’t happy with the delivery costs or time

Statista found that, after abandoning their shopping: 31% purchased from the same website at a later date; 26% bought from a different online retailer; 23% were never serious about buying in the first place and didn’t buy; and eight per cent went into a physical store to buy.

So it is important to get those sales back on track and keep shoppers away from your competitors. Send an automated email reminding shoppers about their abandoned baskets. You can ask if they need any help with anything and even throw in an extra offer to encourage them to complete the sale.

The good news is that, according to Campaign Monitor, 41% of abandoned basket emails are opened – far higher than other marketing emails.

A clear return policy

A free and easy-to-use return policy is always important for an ecommerce retailer, and even more so when shopping for gifts.

Many people will check the return policy before they even consider making a purchase, so if your item is available elsewhere with free returns, you are going to lose a potential sale.

Don’t just have a good return policy, make it very easy to find on your website. Make it clear on your home page and product pages that you offer hassle-free, free returns.

Consider extending the return period to 60 or even 90 days for the festive period, as people often start their Christmas shopping in October. This means you can get some sales in early, and customers can buy with confidence that their friends and family can return any unsuitable gifts.

Don’t forget customer service

More website traffic and more sales also means more queries from shoppers, so make sure you have someone to answer them!

A chatbot on your site is an easy way to deal with most basic questions, but it also makes sense to have staff available to answer any more niche or complex queries. A quick answer to a question from someone who is friendly and knowledgeable, can help to save a sale which might otherwise be lost to a competitor.

Check your checkout

Your customers have come this far – they’ve got items in their basket and they’re ready to buy. You don’t want to lose them now. But is your checkout process as smooth as it should be?

Get your not-so-internet-savvy friend to help again. Are the steps easy to follow? Are you asking for too much unnecessary information?

If a shopper gets confused and can’t see what to click next or doesn’t want to add their address to your site for a second time, you run the risk of losing them.

To make the most of Black Friday and Christmas sales, it is important to really optimise your checkout process, so it is as smooth and easy to follow as possible.

By starting early and taking some time to check your site, smooth out any glitches and update your advertising and social media, your ecommerce site will be ready for your best Christmas and Black Friday ever.

Web design trends for 2022

Wed, 06 Oct 2021 10:40:08 GMT

Web design technology and trends are constantly evolving. What looked good and worked well two years ago may be starting to feel a little dated now. So, as we move towards 2022, it is important to focus on the web design trends for the coming year.

Whether you are starting a brand new business or updating your existing website, it makes sense to be aware of the latest trends and integrate as many of them as possible into your new site.

It doesn’t matter if you are in business to business (B2B) or business to consumer (B2C), your website is your brochure, your business card and your bricks and mortar store all rolled into one – and it needs to do the job of all of those things.

If you walk into a shop and it’s dark and cluttered, and you don’t know where to go for help, you will walk out again. Your visitors will do the same with your website, if they can’t easily see what they are looking for.

If your website looks unattractive and outdated, potential customers will assume your business is outdated too. But if it looks modern and is responsive, it will help turn visitors into customers.

Some aspects, like fast loading speeds and mobile optimisation, aren’t trends. They are absolutely essential for any website if you want visitors to stick around for more than a couple of seconds. However big or small your business and whatever your industry, these are the absolute non-negotiables. It is especially important since Google launched its Page Experience update in May 2021, which puts a greater emphasis on such things when it comes to ranking websites in searches.

Beyond that, the trends you adopt are based on a combination of factors, such as your own budget, your industry and your brand. Some trends will be beyond the budget of a start-up business, while others won’t work for certain industries or brands.

So the choice really is yours. You want to be sure that your website is keeping up with the latest technology and doesn’t look or feel dated, but you also want to be sure it really demonstrates your brand identity.

The key question you need to ask yourself regularly is, ‘If someone landed on my website today, would they be impressed, or would they be ready to leave in a few seconds?’

If the answer is that they would be ready to leave, that is a sure sign it is time to make some changes.

Here are some of the key trends you may want to consider for the coming year…

White space

White space is a trend which isn’t going away, because it really works. It is used by the full range of businesses from new start-ups to huge corporates.

White space allows visitors to take in everything on a page, because the space gives your content room to breathe and allows visitors to give their eyes a break. It also makes a site easier to navigate, as the next steps stand out clearly.

It helps improve readability, which is essential in getting your message across quickly and clearly. Strategically used white space can draw the eye to the key elements of your page – like a call to action (CTA) button.

Bear in mind that white space doesn’t need to be white! It can be any colour (but keep the colour consistent throughout the page). White space is all about keeping the space empty to allow the rest of the page to be seen more clearly.

Fun and optimism

It won’t work for every brand and every industry, but injecting a bit of fun and optimism into your website is a great way to get your business noticed. After a miserable couple of years, many visitors would be very happy to see a site which makes them smile.

Fun and optimistic designs can include bright colours, cheerful illustrations and graphics, unusual (but still legible) fonts and some interactive elements. This sort of design will help your business to stand out from the crowd and help visitors to stick around your site for a bit longer.

Mindful design

Mindful design is another post-pandemic trend, although in many ways it is almost the opposite to the trend for fun designs.

Mindful design means visitors aren’t overwhelmed with too much content and busy graphics on the page. There is plenty of white space, allowing visitors to take in the information they need at their own pace.

In mindful design, designers use muted colours, which are gentler on the eye for people who feel as though they spend their whole lives in front of a screen.

An added bonus of this type of design is that simpler design generally means faster loading speeds and it also generally works better on mobile devices.

3D design

It’s not so long ago that 3D design was only reserved for the biggest and richest companies, but it is becoming far more accessible now. Not only does 3D design look cool, but it is also practical in showing detail of your products, when potential customers can’t get out to see them in person.

Alongside 3D design, web designers are embracing animation, AR, VR and interactive features, all geared towards engaging and entertaining visitors and keeping them on your site for longer.

A small downside to this sort of design is that not everybody in the UK or worldwide has the best connectivity or the fastest Wi-Fi. It is important not to alienate these people with designs which are too complex and could be inaccessible to people with slow Wi-Fi.

Video

Video is another trend that was previously reserved for bigger businesses, which many companies avoided for fear of both the cost and the effect it might have on load time.

But video increases dwell time for the vast majority of visitors – according to Home Business, visitors spend 88% more time on websites with videos. So while load time will be slowed slightly, it may be a price worth paying for many organisations.

To really make the most of video, clips should be between 30 seconds and two minutes long. They should be of high quality and look good on different resolutions and different sized screens.

Original images

The quickest and cheapest way to get images for your website is by using stock photographs. But those stock photographs always look like stock photographs and have probably been used on hundreds of other websites.

To give your brand its own unique identity and help it stand out from the crowd, it is worth investing in your own original images. These could be either your own photos or your own original illustrations.

Illustrations can really tell a story and help enhance your brand identity.

If you’ve got a really good image, you could use it as a hero image for your home page. A hero image is the first thing a visitor sees when they arrive on your site and will help them to decide if they want to stick around. One of the most popular ways of creating a hero image at the moment is to combine a photo with graphical elements.

Look out for local freelance artists, who would probably be very happy to do the work for you, and may work out cheaper than you would expect.

Dark mode

The dark mode trend has been around for a little while now and is still proving popular, with more designers than ever going for dark colour schemes for their websites.

Dark mode design offers a vibrant alternative to more traditional colour templates, which can help your business to stand out from the crowd. Not only does it help to highlight your images and content, it can also minimise eye strain for users.

And to make life even easier for visitors, Google Chrome is actually optimised for dark mode browsing.

Interactive content

Interactive content is a great way to increase dwell time and get visitors engaging with your brand. Few people can resist a quick quiz or poll as they are browsing the internet. Make it relevant and valuable and it will help you to find out more about your customers and potential customers – as well as giving them a little bit of fun and encouraging them to stay on your page a bit longer.

Local SEO

The pandemic brought more of us than ever into contact with the smallest local businesses, and that is a trend businesses should be continuing to embrace into 2022. Web searches with local SEO keywords and phrases like ‘near me’ or ‘close by’ have really taken off in recent years and that shows no slowing down.

If your business operates in a small local area – such as a restaurant, takeaway or beauty salon, it is important that it can be picked up in local searches eg for ‘Cheltenham’, ‘Gloucestershire’ or ‘Cotswolds’.

As we move towards 2022, it is worth taking a look again at your website design. Does it look modern and up-to-date? Does it function as you would like it to? Can visitors navigate it easily?

Web design is an ever evolving field and nothing stays still for long. In 2022, your website needs to be user friendly.

Unfortunately, if your site is starting to get dated, it will be easy for your prospective customers to head to one of your competitors and find a site which does look modern and is easier to navigate. In 2022, that isn’t a risk worth taking.

Starting a blog for your business

Fri, 03 Sep 2021 10:28:54 GMT

Whether you’ve already got a business website, are relaunching your site or starting a new one from scratch, it makes sound business sense to have a blog.

A blog is a great way to bring potential customers to your site through search engine optimisation (SEO). Rather than searching specifically for your products or services, people search for the answers to a particular question or advice on a particular subeject and your blog can provide that for them.

When you use your niche knowledge to write an informative and engaging blog, it builds trust with your audience. A blog makes your business look more credible, which is especially important if your brand is still new and not very well known.

Done well, blogging can be a really integral part of your marketing efforts. But done badly or half-heartedly, it can be a waste of time. So it is important to learn how to start and manage an effective blog which supports your business.

As well as improving your SEO, a blog gives you more content for social sharing (both from your own social media channels and from those of others) and gives you more pages on your website for calls-to-action (CTAs), leading to increased conversions, including subscribers and sales.

So having a blog makes sound business sense, yet it is still something which many companies don’t do or start and forget about after a few weeks or months. The usual excuses are lack of time, lack of writing skills or running out of topics.

If you don’t have time or the skills, find someone in your company who does! Failing that, employ a freelancer to write for you regularly. You may be surprised to discover how cost-effective that can be.

Whatever industry you are in, you shouldn’t run out of topics to write about. We will share some ideas for interesting and relevant blog posts later on in this post.

But first, let’s go back to basics…

What is a blog?

In case you’re not sure, a blog is an informative site (or part of a site) which is regularly updated and often written in a fairly informal or conversational style.

A blog post is a single post (or article) on a blog. It generally covers a single topic or query and can range in length from around 500 words up to 2,000 words or more. (If you need to make it any longer than that, you may wish to consider dividing it into two or three separate posts.) Apart from words, a blog should contain images and may also contain video or other media.

When looking at a blog, you will usually see the most recent blog post at the top.

Blog posts are a way for your business to publish more in-depth insights, thoughts, and stories about any topic relevant to your industry or your company itself. Your blog can help boost brand awareness, credibility, conversions and sales, as well as driving traffic to your website.

Some popular blog formats to get you started are:

The ‘how to’ post – the possibilities here are almost endless. Every industry and business will have a huge range of how tos from how to fix a leaky tap to how to style last year’s outfit, how to get your cakes to rise every time or how to help with GCSE maths homework.

The newsjacking post – you have to act fast with this one! A newsjacking post is when you produce content that references breaking news and trending stories. By jumping on the bandwagon of a trending topic, you will get increased traffic to your site and more eyes on your business. A good example would be a sustainable business publishing a newsjacking post in response to a new climate change story.

The list-based post – this is a great idea for getting lots of views, as people love a list – everything from 20 great days out in the Cotswolds to 50 ways to keep your teenager amused in the school holidays to 10 ways to attract bees to your garden will attract traffic. Putting together a list-based post can be a lot of work, so it makes sense to link back to old posts – if you’ve already written 10 detailed posts on particular days out, you can link back to them. You can even link your list posts to outside sources – as long as they’re not in direct competition with your business.

The pillar page post – sometimes known as an ‘ultimate guide’, a pillar post will be your most authoritative and detailed blog post on a particular subject. Usually longer than other posts, it will take some work to pull it together (again linking back to some of your other posts on the same subject). You definitely won’t start your blog with a pillar post, this is something you should write when you have established some credibility in your niche.

How to write a blog post

Before you write a blog, you need to be sure every post will be interesting and informative enough for someone to read it – and to encourage them to go back to read more.

Before you start writing your blog post, you need to have a clear understanding of your target audience. What will they want to know about? What will they relate to?

If you already have buyer personas of your perfect customer at this point, that makes the process much easier. The more you know about your prospective customers – from age and gender to profession and interests – the easier it is to write posts that will really resonate with them.

A blog should not only answer questions and help readers resolve a challenge, it should do it in a way which is interesting. Your introduction needs to hook the reader and make them want to read on. Then you need to use engaging examples to keep them interested.

A chatty, informal style works well for a blog, but is no excuse for bad grammar or spelling! Make sure you get someone to proofread and edit a blog post before you hit ‘publish’. While readers might let you off the occasional typo, many won’t come back if your posts contain repeated errors, meaning all of your hard work will go to waste.

Setting up a blog

If you already use a CMS for your website, you can set your blog up as part of that. Alternatively, you can start a brand new blog, or blog within a website, using a variety of free or paid-for platforms, such as Wordpress or SquareSpace.

Most business blogs will be part of an existing website, so will only need a separate page on the site eg https://cotswoldcountryside.co.uk/blog but if you set up an entirely separate blog eg https://cotswoldcountrysideblog.co.uk you will need to pay for and register the domain with a company like GoDaddy or 123Reg.

As long as your domain isn’t in great demand, you can usually get one fairly cheaply – for example you can get a .com domain from 123Reg for £15.99 plus VAT per year.

The appearance of your blog should reflect your business and the sort of content you are going to share. If your blog is part of an existing website, the work will already have been done for you. But you may still wish to consider how much branding (logo etc) you put on your blog. While you don’t want it to look like an advert, you do want people to know the source of what they are reading.

If your blog is separate from your main site, put thought into your branding, including the colour, before you write your first post. Examples might include green for a sustainable brand or brown for a vintage clothing company – neither of these examples would lend themselves to bright pink, but a women’s fast fashion brand might do.

Make sure you also include your logo and an ‘About’ page if your blog is separate from your main site. The About page should be a brief introduction to your business. Unless you are working in an area like law or financial services, keep it light and friendly, as it helps people to relate to your business and what you do.

Writing your first blog post

Your first blog post should fit perfectly with your business and its aims, as well as meeting the needs of your potential customers.

But don’t jump straight in with a ‘how to’ post. It’s best to build up a bit of credibility first. Before teaching others how to do something, you’ll want to show that you know what you’re talking about in your field over the course of a few blog posts.

So your first post could focus on one niche area eg reducing food miles if you’re an artisan food producer or a success story from your business eg how you prevented a flood at a customer’s home if you’re a plumber. You could also start with a list post eg five ways to reduce food miles at home or five warning signs that you need to get a plumber in.

Avoid making your first post a ‘Hello and welcome to my new blog’ post. If you want to introduce yourself, do it by focusing on the backstory of your business (as long as it’s an interesting one!).

If you’ve got a team, talk to them about ideas for blog posts too – two (or more) heads are always better than one.

Your post needs a catchy and relevant title (and one which is good for SEO). You may need to try a few different ones and spend a bit of time Googling similar posts to see what ranks well in searches. While you should never copy what others have done, there is no harm in taking inspiration from them.

After putting all this work in, you will be ready to write a post. And you need to grab a reader’s attention from the start with an interesting intro. If it’s not interesting, they won’t read to the end – or even beyond the first paragraph.

A common mistake is to feel that a post should be written in chronological order. But nobody wants to read something that starts: ‘In 2015, it was decided by the committee that…’.

Instead, you need to hit your readers with a joke, an anecdote or an interesting statistic, such as ‘Every year millions of gallons of water in the UK are wasted through leaky taps…’.

Next, describe the purpose of your post and how it will address the problems or issues a reader may be experiencing. This will give them a reason to keep reading to find out how your blog will help improve their lives.

Sometimes, blog posts can contain a huge amount of information, which can be overwhelming for the reader. In this case, it is important to break up and organise the text – use photos or graphics, lists, bullets and sub-headings (which are also good for SEO) to break up the copy and make it feel less intimidating.

As an expert in your field who is writing about something you know well, it shouldn’t be too difficult to write a post. But if you are unsure about something, make sure you check your facts and attribute them to the source of information.

To make your blog really work for your business, end every post with a CTA, to encourage readers to take another step. The CTA could be something like ‘Find out more’, ‘Sign up for free’, ‘Get started’ or ‘Subscribe’.

As your blog becomes more established, gains readers and moves up the search engines, you can move on to writing about bigger subjects, covering more highly-searched keywords. This is when you can start to introduce the ‘how to’ and pillar page posts.

SEO

One of the main reasons for writing a blog is that it’s good SEO for your business. Your first few blog posts aren’t instantly going to rank highly on search engines, but it is still important to get the SEO right from the start.

A big element of SEO is keywords or phrases. If your business is quite niche, make sure you focus on unique keywords which are less likely to appear in hundreds of thousands of other posts across the web. The fact is that, if you’re focusing on the same keywords as Coca Cola or Nike, your little blog is going to get lost.

Don’t leave it to chance and guesswork. It’s very easy to find keywords you can rank for on Google. Using a keyword research tool like Ubersuggest, put in the general topic of your blog eg artisan food. This shows 1600 monthly searches and also suggests some related keywords with a lower search volume, like ‘what is artisanal food’ with 140 searches, ‘artisan food near me’ with 70 searches or ‘artisan food business ideas’ with just 10 searches. By focusing on one of these lower ranking keywords, you will be ranked highly for that keyword – with Nike and Coca Cola nowhere to be seen!

Once you’ve established what keyword you want to use, if you’re still not sure what angle to take with your post, run your keyword through a tool like Ask the Public, which shows the sort of questions people ask in relation to that term.

Whatever your keywords, while it’s important to include them, don’t go over the top and use so many that it makes your writing seem unnatural. Google will frown on posts which are over-stuffed with keywords. Make sure you also use similar words and phrases which have the same meaning.

The title of your post is the most important SEO element you have. It should include keywords or phrases your target audience is interested in and which sum up the purpose of the post. But again, don’t use so many that it sounds clunky and unnatural. Stick to around 65 characters if you can, which is the length preferred by Google and won’t get cut off by search pages.

When breaking up your text with sub-headings, you have another opportunity to use keywords, as long as they are a good fit.

Once you have sorted out your title, fill in the meta description. This is a brief (about 150 characters) intro to what your post is about which will appear below the title on Google searches.

Now you are ready to hit publish! Don’t forget to share your new blog post on your social media and email newsletter to help it get some initial traffic. Encourage followers and subscribers to share it too, to help you reach a bigger audience.

Blogging is a great way to bring new potential customers to your website. It can help you build brand awareness, be seen as an expert in your industry and ultimately increase conversions and sales. If you don’t have a business blog yet, now is the time to think about starting one.

Digital marketing essentials for small businesses

Thu, 24 Jun 2021 10:56:57 GMT

Whether you are just starting out in business, looking to grow an established business or trying to stay afloat in a challenging market, digital marketing is essential for small businesses.

Digital marketing is promoting your brand, products and services and connecting with customers using the internet and other forms of digital communication. This includes your own website, social media, email, online advertising and text messages.

But if it’s just you or a small team running the business, how do you find the time? How do you know which elements of digital marketing are the most important to focus on? Do you even need to do digital marketing at all?

You definitely do need digital marketing – whatever you are selling, whoever you are selling to and however small your business.

Digital marketing is about raising brand awareness and getting people interested in your products so that they go on to become customers. For small businesses, getting the word out can be tough – your website is virtually unknown, your social media following is small and you don’t have the time or the budget to change that dramatically. But you can still make a difference to sales through your marketing efforts.

Digital marketing works for both business to business (B2B) and business to consumer (B2C) companies, but companies should use it in different ways, depending on what they are selling and who they are selling to:

B2B clients tend to have longer decision-making processes, so relationship-building strategies work better for these clients.
B2B transactions are usually based on logic and evidence.
B2C customers tend to respond better to short-term offers and messages
B2C content is more likely to be based on emotion and focused on making the customer feel good about a purchase.

Your website

For most companies, digital marketing starts with their own professional-looking website. This is where you have complete control and can show the world who you are, what you have to sell, how a potential customer can get in touch with you, where you are based and a whole lot more.

Your website should showcase your products and services and also tell prospective customers something unique and memorable about your brand and its values.

You can update your website as often as you want to and it won’t suddenly go out of fashion like social media platforms can do.

Your website will attract traffic in its own right and is also somewhere to send visitors who click on your online advertising and your social media.

Know your audience

When you make a start on your digital marketing, you first need to know who is going to buy what you have to sell. Because it definitely isn’t everyone!

Small businesses generally work in their own specialised area and that’s what you need to focus on. You need to create your own niche which appeals to people who are looking to buy within that niche.

What are they interested in? What are their priorities? What problem are they looking to solve? What pushes them to make a purchasing decision?

When you know the answers to these questions, you can come up with messaging that appeals to that specific audience and shows them that your business has the solution to their problem.

Take your existing customers as a starting point – are there more people like them out there? Or are there other groups of people you think would be interested in what you have to sell? Use that knowledge to create a buyer persona of your ideal customer and make sure your marketing is aimed at them.

What makes you different?

What makes you better or different from the competition? It could be the price, it could be your sustainability credentials, the fact you are a family business or your free shipping.

Whatever it is that makes you different, make sure you highlight it, because it gives you the edge over your competitor and makes prospective customers think that your business should be the right choice.

Ensure the message is clear across all of your digital marketing, including your website, social media and paid ads.

Stay focused

The world of digital marketing is very big and your business is small – as is your budget. So don’t target TikTok if you’re selling to 60-somethings and don’t update your blog twice a week if all of your sales are coming through Instagram.

Target existing customers

Existing customers have already bought from you at least once, so that means they already know, like, and trust your business. If you've provided a good product and good customer service, they are more likely to come back to you in future, rather than go to a competitor.

Don’t bombard them with daily emails, but are there opportunities for repeat

purchases, upselling and cross-selling?

Even if they don’t come back, if your service is good enough, your existing customer might tell their friends about your brand and share their experience on social media.

Blogging

Adding a blog to your website is a great way to generate organic traffic (through searches on Google, Bing etc), particularly for visitors who haven’t yet decided to buy.

Your blog gives customers and prospective customers something extra. It’s not all about selling, it’s about making your business a credible authority in your niche. So if it’s sustainability which makes your business different, write posts on the provenance of your ingredients, how you are trying to reduce carbon emissions in your supply chain or your cycle to work scheme for employees.

Make sure you write for SEO (search engine optimisation). The more often your keywords appear in your high quality, helpful blogposts, the more likely you are to appear in search results. This is especially important if your business operates in a small local area – make sure you include words like ‘Cheltenham’, ‘Gloucestershire’ and ‘Cotswolds’, so it comes up in searches for businesses like yours in the area.

Once you start blogging, you can add a call-to-action on your posts for visitors to subscribe to your blog and receive emails This is a great way to start collecting more information about your potential customers and to target them with exclusive offers.

Don’t have time to write a blog yourself? Get an enthusiastic team member to take it on or use a freelancer.

Use social media

Social media is essential for digital marketing. It is a place to promote your brand, products and services, both organically and through paid advertising. It is somewhere you can answer customers’ queries and you can even sell direct from social media – something which is particularly popular with the youngest consumers.

But you can’t do it all. Start with two or three platforms and get those right before expanding if you need to. Your target audience will have a preferred platform, so that is the place to start.

Facebook is still by far the biggest social media platform and is the place to be for slightly older consumers, although 61.3% of global Facebook users are under 35. In the UK, Facebook has a reach of 38 million people, which is 66% of the total UK population over 13 years old, according to Digital 2021: Global Overview report.

If your brand lends itself well to video, YouTube could be the one to target. It is the world’s second most popular social media platform after Facebook. With over 2 billion users and an estimated 1 billion hours of video consumed daily, the potential reach is enormous.

Instagram has 32 million users in the UK, with a gender split of 54% female to 46% male. Usually seen as a place to share photos, the use of video is on the rise, with video accounting for 17.8% of all Instagram posts.

Instagram is a particularly good way to target millennials. The largest share of Instagram users are aged between 25 and 34 years old, at 30.9 percent. This is followed by users in the 18 to 24 years old category, according to Statista. If you are targeting the very youngest consumers, Gen Z (16-24 year olds), you can’t ignore TikTok. TikTok is all about videos of between 15 and 60 seconds. It is a fun tool, which shows a less polished side to your brand, but can still drive traffic to your website.

TikTok was the most downloaded app of 2020, with 2.6 billion downloads worldwide.

It had 8.5 million users in the UK in 2020 and this is expected to rise to 10.9 million in

2021.

Online advertising

Online advertising might sound expensive, but it is actually within the budget of most small businesses. The best place to start is with Google Ads, but Facebook Ads can also prove valuable. And, depending on your target audience, you may want to also consider advertising with other social media like Instagram or TikTok.

Even for a small business, Google Ads’ pay-per-click (PPC) advertising service can make a real difference to how your company ranks in searches. It is suitable for businesses with any budget, as you can limit your spending to ensure you don’t go over budget and adjust it as often as you need to.

PPC advertising means you only pay when someone clicks your ad. With more traditional advertising, your adverts are reaching people who probably don’t want to see them, but Google Ads are only shown to people who are actively searching for what you have to offer. Anyone searching for the terms you choose eg ‘swimming classes Gloucestershire’ is more likely to come to your site and make a purchase after seeing your ads.

Google Ads is a level playing field which allows you to compete with bigger

companies. If you have bid the most to rank for ‘swimming classes Gloucestershire’, you will appear at the top of the ranking, regardless of the size of your company.

With Google Ads, your ads will be displayed instantly. Depending on how specific your keywords are (keyword phrases of three to five words are best for small businesses), you could immediately be displayed at the top of the search ranking for the keywords you have bid on.

Facebook Ads will help you find people who are interested in what your business has to offer, but are unlikely to buy straightaway. While Facebook doesn’t show people ads for things they are actively searching for, it does understand its users very well, because it collects a lot of data. Taking into account things like the pages a person engages with, their date of birth, their location and their friends, it will show users ads for things they will almost certainly be interested in.

Facebooks Ads provides a wide range of targeting options based on demographics and behaviour. It is very affordable, particularly when targeting a local area, so it is cost-effective for small businesses like coffee shops, hair salons and convenience stores.

Digital marketing might sound daunting for a small business, but there are lots of steps you can take to build your online presence. While things like blogging will take a while to make an impact, social media posts and online advertising can have an immediate effect.

Think about which areas of digital marketing will work best for your business and the audience you want to reach, then start by investing time in them, before moving on to the other areas.

Ecommerce tips for small businesses

Fri, 04 Jun 2021 09:16:18 GMT

Whether you are a brand new business, a business moving into ecommerce for the first time or a more established company looking to grow its ecommerce offering, it is all very exciting.

But it can also seem pretty daunting for a small business. How can your little company with its small product range compete with the might of Amazon or the big high street brands’ huge ecommerce sites?

The good news is, that you definitely can! Of course you will make mistakes along the way, but these ecommerce tips should help you to avoid making too many.

The key thing is to do you. Focus on what you are good at and watch your small ecommerce business grow.

A good first impression

I t takes no more than a few seconds for a visitor to decide whether or not they like your brand and your website. So it is essential to create a good first impression.

The first impression needs to include the look of your site and your branding, your products and the functionality of your website.

While it is tempting to get your website up and running before it is completely ready, this would be a big mistake. You can add more pages later, but you should never leave any blank pages or important details missing, as that will be your visitors’ first (and almost certainly last) impression of your business.

While your website will never appeal to everyone, the important thing is for it to appeal to potential customers who are looking for products in your niche.

Get it right and a good first impression can be the beginning of brand loyalty and a customer relationship that could last for years.

Experiment

You will never get everything right first time, so it’s important to experiment and keep checking your data. To bring customers to your website, you will need to advertise. So experiment with your ads – change your images, experiment with different copy and advertise in different places, such as Google, Facebook or Instagram.

Experiment with your website too. How much information should you have on your home page? Which images do customers respond to? Where is the best place to put your call to action buttons? How much do customers want to read about your products?

It’s easy to make assumptions about what will work, but you will never be sure without testing different versions and checking your data.

Listen to Customers

Listening to customers is key for any business, but especially a small business. And both positive and negative feedback is helpful.

Combining good products with high levels of customer service is what really builds a brand and helps it to grow. Read customer reviews and respond – thank customers for their feedback and make changes if they are needed. This could be changes to your website or even improvements to your products.

Show that you respect and value your customers by responding to their feedback, whether via email or social media, within 24 hours. This helps to build a relationship and can even turn unhappy customers into happy ones. It will also help build brand awareness and loyalty, which is essential for a small business.

If you do something well, your customers will talk to people about it, post on social media or post positive reviews, all of which will help bring more potential customers to your site and help grow your brand.

(Don’t forget they will also post the negatives too, so always do your best to avoid creating problems or making them worse!)

Omnichannel selling

In 2021, ecommerce is about so much more than just your website. To make your business a success, you need to embrace omnichannel selling. This means selling on the marketplaces, like Amazon, eBay or Etsy, and through social media, as well as through your own website.

It won’t be possible to sell across all channels from the start, so again it is important to know and understand your customers. Are they more likely to buy from Amazon or Etsy? Are they spending more time on Instagram or TikTok?

On the other hand, don’t make the mistake of focusing on only one social media platform. If a competitor sees you are only on Instagram, they can focus their efforts on Facebook, TikTok and Twitter and suddenly their business has the edge over yours.

Using a combination of platforms is slightly more work, but it gives you a competitive advantage. Being on three to four platforms is usually manageable and stops you from putting all of your eggs in one basket. Social media moves quickly and if your chosen platform falls out of favour with your customer base, you could see a sudden dip in sales.

Remember that social media is a two-way thing. Don’t just focus on the messages you put out, monitor the reactions you are getting back from customers and potential customers. These comments and likes will give you a very clear indication of who your customers are and what they are interested in, which can help you to make adjustments to your online offering to appeal to them more and grow your customer base.

As your business grows, you can gradually expand your omnichannel strategy to take in more channels.

Advertising

Online advertising is essential for any ecommerce business to bring potential customers to their website. And you should embrace advertising from day one.

Many businesses find that Google Ads are the best place to start. After all, there are three billion Google searches a day worldwide. If you bid on the right keywords and target them at the right audience, Google Ads can be effective and give you a good return on your investment (ROI), as your ads are shown to people who are actively searching for what you have to sell.

Advertising on social media tends to be a bit cheaper and can work just as well, as long as you target your ads effectively. While Facebook Ads won’t show potential customers your products, they will help you find new customers who are interested in buying what you have to sell. Facebook Ads are very well targeted, as they collect lots of user data to ensure your ads reach the right audience.

It might take a few attempts to perfect your online ads, but once you’ve got them right, keep reinvesting in advertising and watch your business grow.

Focus on the competition

Successful ecommerce businesses always have an eye on the competition. It’s important to learn from what they do well and to look for the things they’re not doing so well and make sure you do them better!

Bigger, more established companies can feel like a threat. But you can also learn from them. Look to brands you admire – whether or not they are in your niche. What do they do well that you can replicate? Maybe their customer service is second to none, perhaps it is their branding or their environmental credentials? These are all valuable things you can learn from and replicate for your brand, without actually copying them.

If you think you will never be able to compete with the big companies in your niche, remember that you are introducing a new brand or new products and services because there is a gap in the market for them.

You have something that your competition doesn’t – that could be the products themselves, or the way in which they are made, the provenance of your ingredients or raw materials or the environmentally friendly packaging you use.

Focus your messaging on the things which make your business different from the competition and make sure this authentic message runs through your website, your advertising and your social media.

Be flexible

A business should never be set in stone. To be successful, it needs to be flexible and adapt.

Being flexible means you are a better listener to your customers, willing to adapt and change and always ready to embrace the next big thing, whether that is technology to help your business or new products.

Being flexible gives you competitive advantage and keeps you ahead of the game. It is easier for a small business than it is for a larger business, as you will have less products, less staff and no huge international supply chain to deal with.

Small businesses which fall behind will be the ones which aren’t flexible, don’t make changes and don’t embrace new technologies which can help them run more smoothly and effectively. Something that worked well five years ago may not work as well today, just as something which works well today probably won’t be as effective in five years’ time.

Be the best

It is impossible for any business to be the best at everything, but even a small ecommerce business should strive to be the best at what they do. Being really good at one thing helps with the growth of your business.

As a business owner, you are no doubt passionate about what you do and that emotional connection and drive will keep it moving forward. But what about when everything involved in running a small business feels overwhelming and too much for one person or a small team?

It is easy for a small or new business to focus on everything at once and try to do too much. But try to forget briefly about all the minor niggles involved and focus on the bigger picture.

What is the purpose of your brand? What do you want it to achieve? Then ask yourself how to be the best at those things and prioritise your work to make it happen.

Once you have focused on the most important thing, you can then prioritise everything else and these obstacles should seem less overwhelming.

Starting or growing an ecommerce business as a small company isn’t easy. But business owners do it because they love it and see a gap in the market that they can fill.

By focusing on your passion, the things that you do well and listening to your customers, it is possible for even the smallest ecommerce business to grow and put a dent in the big companies’ market share.

Web design and strategy to improve your online presence

Tue, 25 May 2021 11:19:22 GMT

Whether an ecommerce site or the digital version of a bricks-and-mortar store, your website is an essential part of your business which can boost sales, increase brand identity and build a relationship with your customers.

A well designed website should help to attract more organic traffic to your business and can help you get a foothold in your industry. If your market is niche, your website has great potential to attract visitors because you are offering something unique.

Within a few seconds of landing on your site, a potential customer needs to know exactly what your business is all about. And if they can’t, you need to make changes to optimise your website and improve your online presence.

Your website might look stunning or your blog might be full of interesting and unique posts, but if nobody sees it or you have issues with the design and navigation, all of your hard work will go to waste.

It is important to spend time managing and improving your online presence. Set a budget and focus on the areas which are likely to be the biggest wins for your business.

If your website isn’t giving you the results you would like, what can you focus on to improve your web design and boost your online presence?

SEO

SEO, or search engine optimisation, increases traffic and improves brand recognition and online presence. It is all about being picked up by search engines – mainly Google, but also Bing, Yahoo and others.

The aim with SEO is to get your site on the first page of a search engine and as close to the top as possible. The closer you are to the top, the more traffic, leads and sales you will get.

Search engines rely on people searching for certain keywords on Google and the other search engines. For SEO to work, you need to focus on those keywords in your content.

Clearly if you are running a small local café, you’re not going to beat McDonald’s on Google searches, but you can focus on local SEO to boost your rankings. So use relevant keywords for your local area eg ‘Cheltenham’ or ‘Gloucestershire’. That way, if someone searches ‘coffee shop Cheltenham’, your coffee shop should be right up there with Costa and Starbucks, because the search was specific to a small local area.

Search engines like regular fresh and relevant content. So try to produce something new every week or every month which is related to the products or services you provide. If you are unsure what to write about, use tools like Answer the Public to see what people are searching for in your niche.

In the past, SEO was very focused on the written word. But more businesses are using video on their websites because their audiences prefer it. Things like ‘how-to’ videos and product demonstrations are popular and can really boost your rankings.

You don’t even have to invent something new every time. Could you repurpose some of your blog content as video? If your videos also get shared on social media, that is another great way to bring visitors to your site.

It’s important to remember that SEO doesn’t work overnight. It is all about playing the long game. You should start to see results in four to six months, and things will continue to improve after that. So your results after 12 months should be better than your results after six months.

If you don’t have time to wait, it makes sense to invest in some online paid advertising alongside your SEO, so you can bring potential customers to your site that way too.

Blog

Fundamentally, all companies want to make money. But not every page on your site needs to focus on selling. In fact, taking a softer approach through your blog (or video content) can really pay off.

For small businesses especially, producing online content which is valuable to your visitors can be the best way to attract new customers and make more sales. Your blog is a great way to introduce your business to a new audience and every new post you produce is a boost to your online presence.

A blog is fundamental to SEO and is often the cornerstone of a company’s online presence. Your posts can reach people who would never have searched specifically for your product or your company. But in searching for answers to a query, they find your blog – and from there they find your brand and your products.

To produce a really valuable blog, focus on your ideal customer and what they would want to know about – then write posts which answer their questions.

Whatever the subject matter, make sure your blogposts or video content are enjoyable and inject the subject with your company’s unique personality.

CRO

Your online presence can almost certainly be boosted by conversion rate optimisation (CRO). Adjusting low performing landing pages is a good way to achieve results.

When a visitor lands on your site, whether through advertising, your home page or blog, you need to guide them to the parts of your website where they will take the action you want them to take. That could be a purchase, downloading a piece of free content or something else.

Move through your website as a prospective customer would – or get someone else to do it for you. Is it clear what the next steps should be? Are you offering enough choices or too many? Anywhere you can smooth out the journey will reduce friction for users and make them more likely to move all the way through your site and make a purchase.

But how can you be sure what will and won’t work on your customer’s journey? Strategically placed buttons will help people to move through your site without getting lost, overwhelmed or confused.

But be careful about offering too many choices or encouraging people to buy as soon as they arrive on your site. By pushing people to buy too early or giving them too many choices, it is more likely they will take no action at all.

To be sure you’ve got it right, test different elements of your site and individual key pages to see which element works best in increasing conversions or sales.

The way to do this is through A/B testing, in which you change just one element of your page eg page layout, call to action (CTA) text or button colour and test it against your existing design. For example, you might test a ‘Buy it now’ button against an ‘Add to basket’ button.

If you see a change in conversion rate as a result of your testing, you will know that element makes a difference and should become a permanent change. Making that change is optimising your website.

Then move on to testing another element, until you are confident that your website is meeting users’ needs and performing as well as possible.

Optimise for mobile

In 2021, every company needs to optimise its website for smartphones. You should assume that the majority of users will be arriving at your website from mobile devices and optimise your website to meet their needs.

Optimising for mobile shouldn’t be an afterthought, it has to be something which is considered right from the start. This is very different from the viewpoint from a few years ago of just providing a ‘mobile version’ of your website.

Mobile traffic has been on the rise for a number of years and it is showing no sign of slowing down. Mobile currently accounts for around 56% of web traffic worldwide, compared to just 5% a decade earlier.

This figure is likely to be much higher for consumer-facing brands and could be as high as 80% in some situations, particularly with the rise in home working following the pandemic.

In the UK, 84% of adults aged 16 and over own a smartphone and they spend an average of two hours and 34 minutes on their phones every day. An incredible 98% of 16-24 year olds own a smartphone, as do 95% of 45-54 year olds. The rate of smartphone ownership only starts to decline after the age of 55.

So it is essential that your website meets your prospective customers where they hang out – on their mobiles – and works just as well as it would on a desktop or laptop.

While it is important that websites load quickly on all devices, this is especially important for mobile users, who have very little patience for slow loading times and generally want answers to their questions immediately.

Simplified navigation is especially important for mobile users too. Avoid complicated menus and too many clicks to reach content and make sure you streamline and simplify the way you display information.

Businesses that get mobile right will also find they rank higher on search engines, generating more traffic as they are more visible in searches.

Improving your online presence isn’t something you can do quickly, or something that you just do once and forget about it. It is something you need to work on regularly as it is essential for the long-term growth and visibility of your brand.

Focus on the key areas of your business to help people find you, get to know you and ultimately become loyal customers.

Choosing the right platform for your ecommerce business

Tue, 04 May 2021 11:34:47 GMT

Whether you are just starting out in ecommerce or you want to adapt and improve your ecommerce website, there are a lot of things to consider.

You’ve probably got your business name, logo, branding and product or service range ready to go. You may even have a website that you are very happy with. But are you ready to sell online?

When starting out in ecommerce, it’s important to not just consider what your business needs now, but to look to the future and consider the tools you will need as your business grows.

Today’s ecommerce brands don’t just choose the best online store builder, they look for the best ecommerce platform. An ecommerce platform is a set of tools that work seamlessly and give you complete control over your business, as well as the ability to scale as you grow.

An ecommerce platform is so much more than a tool to list products and take online payments. It is a way to grow your brand online, by creating an online experience that allows you to make sales and deliver customer orders, no matter where they are based. The very best ecommerce platforms should be a complete business command centre, from which you can control everything from stock levels to marketing.

Hosting

Some ecommerce platforms have built-in hosting, while others require you use self-hosting or open-source hosting.

Hosted platforms take away the worry and hassle of self-hosting or looking for a third-party hosting service. Updates will be automatic, so you will always have the latest version of your ecommerce platform.

Self-hosted, or non-hosted, ecommerce platforms require companies to use their own server space or pay for space from a hosting provider. This can make ongoing website management complex, as you are responsible for updates, maintenance, and bug fixes. Potentially, it can take up staff time which may be better used elsewhere.

Using a third party to host your website data will incur additional costs. Smaller and newer businesses will typically opt for the lowest cost plans, which have the lowest levels of customer support and you may find you require more support than your host offers.

Types of ecommerce

The main types of ecommerce are business-to-consumer (B2C, sometimes also referred to as direct-to-consumer or DTC) and business-to-business (B2B). B2B ecommerce includes both selling for use by the business (eg machinery or office supplies) and wholesale selling, when the buying business buys products and sells them for a profit.

The type of ecommerce business you have will be a key factor in deciding which platform will be best for you to use.

Here we take a look at some of the most popular ecommerce platforms and what they can offer to individual businesses.

It’s important to remember that there is no single ‘best’ platform. Every business is different with different needs. The best ecommerce platform for your brand is the one which meets all the needs of your business and your customers. The ecommerce platform you choose should give your customers an easy shopping experience which makes them want to come back for more.

All pricing is correct to the best of our knowledge at the time of writing in May 2021.

Shopify

Shopify’s ecommerce platform is perfect for omnichannel selling. Its tools and features mean you can sell directly through your own website, at your physical store, on social media and through third-party marketplaces, like Amazon, eBay and Etsy.

Shopify handles your whole business from payment processing to in-person sales and fulfilment, to ensure your products reach your customers. It is also compatible with a large number of third-party apps to further enhance its capabilities.

Using Shopify’s tools and features, it is easy to get an ecommerce business off the ground, even with limited technical knowledge. It is also a good tool for scaling up your business without ever needing to change platforms, however much your business grows.

Shopify is priced between $29 and $299 per month, depending on which plan you use.

Wix

Wix is an easy to use drag-and-drop website builder, which offers web hosting, domain name registration and customisable templates. While you can build a basic website for free using Wix, you will need to upgrade to use its ecommerce platform.

With Wix you can accept online payments, sell on multiple channels and set up abandoned checkout campaigns.

But it may not be the best choice for bigger businesses or those with large product ranges. Wix lacks inventory management features, such as low stock alerts. So if you stock a lot of different products, you will probably need an ecommerce platform which has better inventory tracking.

With Wix, you can’t sell products directly from social media (also known as social commerce). To make this work, you will need to combine Wix with a third-party app.

Wix ecommerce plans range in price from £13 to £22 per month.

Squarespace

Like Wix, Squarespace is another drag-and-drop website builder, which isn’t primarily designed as an online selling platform.

It takes a fair bit of work to set up Squarespace to sell online, but it does have some useful tools, including good inventory tracking.

If you have a Squarespace website, as an alternative to turning it into a Squarespace online store, you can add the Shopify Buy Button to your site. This gives you all the benefits of Shopify, including the ability to add unlimited products and secure checkouts, without the need to move your entire operation to Shopify.

Ecommerce plans on Squarespace are priced between £15 and £30 per month.

BigCommerce

BigCommerce is an ecommerce platform which can handle the demands of a big company. It offers both web hosting and a large range of customisation options, but you can’t register a domain name through BigCommerce.

Useful features include international selling, SEO tools, and omnichannel selling on social media and marketplaces like Amazon, eBay and Etsy.

BigCommerce isn’t as simple to use as Shopify or Wix. People who lack technical knowledge may prefer to work with an ecommerce platform which is easier to operate.

BigCommerce is priced between $29.95 and $299.95 per month, depending on which plan you use.

Big Cartel

Big Cartel is a fully hosted ecommerce platform and website builder which is specifically designed for artisan makers, crafters and artists – the sort of small business you would expect to find on Etsy.

Big Cartel offers domain name registration, customisable templates and marketing tools. Its payment options are fairly limited, so Big Cartel probably wouldn’t be the right choice for a business hoping to scale up into omnichannel selling.

The platform’s pricing is based on how many products a company sells, so it can increase quickly as your business and product range grow.

Big Cartel is priced between $9.99 and $29.99 per month, depending how many products a business sells.

WooCommerce

WooCommerce is basically an add-on to WordPress, which is traditionally a blogging and content-driven platform. With WooCommerce, businesses can add ecommerce to their WordPress site.

WooCommerce isn’t hosted, so a business has the additional cost and responsibility of managing the website hosting.

Because WordPress is primarily a content management system (CMS) rather than an ecommerce platform, many of WooCommerce’s selling features rely on adding apps and plug-ins. There is a good range of apps and plug-ins available, but the more you add, the more likely it is that something will go wrong. For a larger business or one with a big product range, that may not be a risk worth taking.

WooCommerce is free to use, but with additional costs for hosting and domain.

Magento

Magento isn’t for the faint-hearted, but if you have a big business with a large product range and someone in your team with the right skills, it could be worth considering.

Magento is a non-hosted ecommerce platform designed for developers who want a flexible, powerful and customisable system. This is good news for brands which want a completely bespoke platform. But if you don’t have advanced coding and development skills, it may be too much of a challenge, and you will almost certainly have to get an outside company to do the work. It also works out considerably more expensive than the other platforms.

Magento lacks the tools for omnichannel selling and social commerce – two key ecommerce trends which are growing fast.

All prices for Magento are individual, but design and development can be between £10,000 and £25,000, with hosting at around £40 per month.

PrestaShop

PrestaShop is the biggest ecommerce platform in Europe and Latin America. It is an open-source platform, which is free to download and use.

PrestaShop tools and features include international selling, inventory and analytics reporting. Businesses have lots of control over privacy and security settings of their PrestaShop site.

It offers real value for money for new and small businesses, although it does require some technical knowledge. With no customer support package, users do a lot of troubleshooting themselves, with the help of other PrestaShop users.

Although the free platform is a great place for cash-strapped businesses to start, maintaining your ecommerce site with PrestaShop may prove difficult in the long-term.

PrestaShop is free to use.

All of these ecommerce platforms offer something slightly different and the best choice for you might not be the best choice for another business, even one operating in the same market. When deciding which platform to use, you need to consider your own unique business needs and goals.

It is tempting to just opt for the easiest and most affordable platform. But will the cheapest choice today still work for your business in a year or five years? It is a big decision and you need to think about the growth of your business and anticipate your future needs. The best platform will be one which can work with those future needs.

In terms of cost, you will need an ecommerce platform that won’t cost a fortune, but still has the features you need to operate your business smoothly and make a profit. The cost of a platform is about more than the set-up and the monthly fees. Will you need to also pay for hosting or for customer support, if it isn’t included in your package?

Once you’ve taken all of these factors into account, it should be easier to decide on the right ecommerce platform for your business.

Ecommerce in a post-pandemic world

Tue, 27 Apr 2021 10:07:28 GMT

As soon as the Covid-19 pandemic hit the UK, sending the country into lockdown in March 2020, years of ecommerce growth happened in just a few weeks.

The pandemic forced people to change their behaviour and embrace shopping online like never before – and many of them will stick with those changes permanently.

As shops were forced to close, ecommerce reached an all time high. Previously used mainly by Gen Z and Millennials, older people too started shopping online. Worldwide, nearly 150 million people shopped online for the first time during the pandemic, with 84% of consumers making an online purchase during that time.

Some businesses were ready for this unprecedented growth and able to adapt and respond, while others weren’t.

Companies which thought the whole thing would last a few weeks and they would just weather the storm missed out in a big way. Nobody could have foreseen another two national lockdowns and restrictions lasting for over year.

Businesses which already had thriving ecommerce operations were in the driving seat. They didn’t need a complete rethink of their business model, they were able to build on their expertise. The challenge for other companies was keeping up with them and making sure they got their share of the sales.

A year on, that challenge remains. The shops may have reopened, but many people are still wary of shopping in store. The pandemic brought about huge changes and those changes will remain for consumers and businesses alike.

If you want to benefit from these changes, drive more traffic and convert that traffic into sales for your ecommerce site, it is important to tap into the industry trends which are making a difference.

O mnichannel selling

Customers expect easy-to-use and intuitive experiences across different devices and channels. Brands which can deliver on that will see the best returns.

Omnichannel selling is a seamless and consistent shopping experience across channels, from your own website to social media to the big marketplaces, and across devices from smartphones to desktops. It is all about gearing up the ecommerce experience to the needs of the consumer, rather than what is more convenient for your business.

Omnichannel selling is becoming cheaper and more accessible, so it is no longer limited to big businesses with budgets to match. But it’s also not possible for a small or new business to be everywhere, so start with the channels your customers go the most and sell to them there – whether that is Amazon, Instagram, TikTok or somewhere else.

Customers who have a memorable experience while shopping will be more likely to return and a brand which can give them that omnichannel experience will be in a really competitive position.

M arketplaces

Businesses which have only recently developed their ecommerce may struggle to get noticed online. Many shoppers prefer the convenience of shopping with the big marketplaces eg Amazon, eBay and Etsy. These marketplaces offer free or low price delivery and everything a customer could want all in one place.

Marketplaces are undoubtedly one of the fastest ways to build your brand and increase your reach . Most importantly, half of all global ecommerce sales take place on marketplaces, according to Shopify.

Customers using the marketplaces are rarely searching for brands, they are searching for solutions and product types eg popular lockdown purchases like patio furniture, ladies’ loungewear or strength training equipment.

So if you’re just starting out, it makes sense to focus at least some of your efforts into selling in the marketplaces. That way, you can benefit from the high traffic and all of the advantages of working with a big business which really knows its stuff when it comes to selling online.

Make your marketplace product pages and images as beautiful as you would on your own website, to create an experience which customers will find it hard to ignore.

Y our own website

While marketplaces are a good place to get noticed, don’t concentrate all of your efforts on them. Your own website is still really key to your ecommerce operation.

Marketplaces are a double-edged sword, which help you to drive sales by reaching customers who would never have found your website, but put pressure on prices and margins.

It’s essential not to ignore your own website while you are building your presence on Amazon, eBay, Etsy or any of the other marketplace. It’s important to remember that you don’t own the customer data when you sell on sites like Amazon, which can be a limit for your own brand’s growth.

So use marketplaces to sell limited products and drive traffic to your own website. Using the two together is all part of your omnichannel retailing.

Data from Shopify shows that consumers’ main reasons for shopping at a large, corporately owned business (like a marketplace) include:

Product selection (57%)
Low prices (51%)
Reliable (34%)

But the important thing to remember is that a lot of customers like to shop with small, independent and family businesses, which can often offer an alternative to the big brands.

Data from Shopify shows consumers’ top reasons for shopping at an independently owned business (online or in store) include:

Supporting entrepreneurship (33%)
Unique products (33%)
Good customer service (31%)

Even though so much business is now conducted online, customers still like a personal, human touch. This could be a personalised thank you email or a product which is carefully wrapped in brown paper and string, rather than shoved in an ordinary jiffy bag.

So marketplaces can drive business to your website in the first place, but then you need to focus on offering something the marketplaces can’t. By providing a personalised purchase journey through your own ecommerce site, you can start to build a relationship with customers which will encourage them to keep coming back for more.

M ake it easy for customers

If you want customers to buy from your ecommerce store and keep coming back for more, you have to make it easy for them.

The majority of customers in the UK say that free delivery is a big factor in whether they choose to buy from a retailer. In fact, according to Shopify, 65% of consumers check whether free delivery is available before they even consider adding an item to their baskets.

Although it is a careful balancing act which could affect your bottom line, offering free delivery where possible could make a big difference to your sales. And if it’s too expensive for you to offer it with every purchase, consider setting a free delivery threshold for purchases over a certain amount, such as £20 or £50.

Even if you’ve got fantastic products and free delivery, it could all still go wrong at checkout. Your checkout pages are critical and a huge number of consumers are still happy to walk away, leaving several products in their basket, if the process isn’t quick and easy.

Options to speed up the process include:

· Save payment and delivery information, to allow for faster checkout for future purchases

· On the flip side, allow ‘guest checkout’, so customers don’t have to input as much information for a single purchase

· Cut out the ‘add to basket’ step by allowing customers to buy directly from your product pages

· Make the checkout process easy to use on mobiles

· Address security concerns with security trust marks such as Norton and Verisign, which is especially reassuring for customers who are new to your brand.

U se your analytics

To make the most of ecommerce opportunities for your business, you need to make the best use of your analytics. Basic data like click-through rates for specific campaigns and conversion metrics showing where the majority of your traffic and sales are coming from are essential.

But can you get much more from your analytics? The more data you have, the better you will understand your customers and the better you can target your site, your products and your brand to meet their needs.

If you can’t get all of this information from your analytics, can you upgrade to another (or additional) system which will give you more? The sort of essential data you are looking for includes:

· Which channels led customers to your site

· Detailed customer data including geographical area, age, gender, total spend and buying habits

· Which content (both on your site and externally) leads to the most conversions

This sort of information can help you to identify trends such as which products are refunded or returned most often, which customers prefer discounted items and which customers are more likely to abandon their purchases at checkout.

S hoppable ads on social media

Social media is a trend which isn’t going anywhere. Younger shoppers, including Generation Z (16-24 year olds) and Millennials (25-39 year olds), spend hours scrolling through their Instagram and TikTok feeds. So it is a great place to advertise your products.

Generation Z in particular like to buy things they’ve seen on social media and they don’t like the inconvenience of navigating away to a website. So it’s important that you make it possible to shop straight from the ads. If you don’t allow shopping straight from your social media ads, you can guarantee your competition will, and you will lose out on valuable business.

Video advertising can bring your products to life, with tutorials and ‘how to’ videos, or you can create slideshows from your product images. Use careful targeting for your ads eg geographical location, age, gender etc to ensure they are reaching the right audience.

While 2020 was a year we will never forget, it opened up huge ecommerce opportunities for businesses that were ready to take them. And as we move into a post-pandemic world, those opportunities are still there.

Customers have taken their business online and many of them won’t be going back to the shops any time soon, thanks to a combination of the huge choice online and safety fears.

Follow these tips and you will be ready to meet the needs of those customers in 2021 and beyond.

Web design in a post-pandemic world

Wed, 21 Apr 2021 10:14:36 GMT

Throughout 2020 and 2021, we have lived more of our lives online than ever before.

Whether through working from home and the endless Zoom and Teams meetings or doing all but the most essential of grocery shopping online, we have all spent many hours stuck in front of a screen.

To help us all feel that bit more comfortable online, web design has seen a subtle shift – in everything from even more user friendly and intuitive ways to work to colour palettes which are more gentle on the eyes.

This isn’t a new thing - most design trends rise organically through priorities, users and the web itself changing and growing. Many new and popular web design features aren’t driven by the whims of design agencies, but by user interactions.

If you want to stay ahead of the game in 2021, attract new customers and keep hold of existing ones, it would be worth looking at your own website to see where you can make some of these changes for your business.

As good as the real thing

We’ve all been excluded from so much ‘real life’ over the last few months, but website design can create experiences which are almost as good as the real thing.

With most people having access to faster internet speeds, multimedia web experiences are popping up everywhere in web design. They make a richer user experience by bringing together visuals, text, video and audio, and they are no longer reserved for only the biggest companies with the biggest budgets.

Multimedia experiences in 2021 should aim to give users a real feel for your business, without overwhelming them with too much going on. For big ticket products and key pages on your website, use different media (video, audio etc) thoughtfully to maximise availability and choice of content – some people like to watch a video, some like to read text, while some just prefer to listen.

Give users chance to watch your videos in their own time, and pause or rewind as they need to, with a clear ‘play’ button, rather than just auto playing video or animations.

Augmented reality (AR) is becoming an affordable option for more and more companies, with a growing number of ecommerce sites tapping into the trend. If customers need to travel a long way to your bricks and mortar store, or you’ve noticed less people going into your shop since Covid, this is a way of allowing customers to experience your products without leaving the comfort of their homes.

And if AR is a step too far for your small business, simply providing additional photos and the ability to zoom in will go a long way towards helping customers understand your products better.

M ore like real life

In a time when the online world has almost had to replace the real one for many people, designers are making an effort to blend the digital world with the real world and make their websites even more like real life.

Many users don’t want to lose the physical world to the digital one entirely – which is why there has been a growth in the sales of vinyl LPs in the time of Spotify. A key design trend around this theme is layouts and fonts which are reminiscent of a newspaper or magazine. Layouts and fonts inspired by print media bring familiarity and memories of the tactile nature of reading from paper, as well as an intuitive experience for the user.

Products are at the heart of most websites and the right imagery can make them feel more organic and real than ever. Rather than flat vertical images in boxes and rectangles, experiment with different shapes and angles to bring your products to life. Can you show your products in circles or rounded rectangles rather than more harsh geometric designs?

Show your support

Web design has always been focused on delivering great user experiences. In 2021, the best user experience (UX) will come from shared values and joint causes. Throughout 2021, we will see web designers continue to value their role in helping the world through troubled times.

2020 and 2021 have been about many bad and unforeseen things, but out of that, we have seen a lot of good arising from businesses and local communities alike. This is something which is set to continue, and something you can share through your website design.

As a brand, focus your web design on the virtues of your business, such as your sustainability efforts or community involvement. Customers want to do business with brands which they see doing something for the environment, charities or their local community.

The last few months have seen a real focus on diversity too, so make sure your imagery reflects society and the diversity of your customers. Photos and illustrations on your website should show different races and cultural backgroun ds, same sex relationships and families, people with disabilities and people of all ages. Customers who see themselves in your brand are far more likely to buy from your company than one which uses imagery reflecting only a very small sector of society.

S imple headers

There are few things more frustrating for a user than a website which is slow to load. Websites which load slowly are also viewed negatively by Google, which is bad for your site’s ranking and SEO.

Web design in 2021 has come up with a simple solution to this problem, which is good for users and for your Google ranking. In many cases it is your header which is causing your site to slow down, so designers are moving away from big images to large text headers instead.

This sort of simplified header will dramatically reduce your loading speed and improve your SEO. It will also bring the focus right back to your key message, rather than on an image which may look striking, but could be open to interpretation. This makes life easier for the user as they know exactly what your business is all about right from the start. And if your site loads quickly and the user quickly sees what they are looking for, that is good for your business too.

Simplified registration

Spending so much time online for users can mean an awful lot of remembering passwords and inputting email addresses. Sometimes it feels like they are needed for every website we visit and every purchase we make. But does it really need to be like that?

In 2021, try not to complicate interfaces and force users to take extra actions. Making life easier for your users by cutting down the detail can really give your website the edge.

Simplified registration and signing in is one of the latest user experience (UX) trends. For example, when a returning customer logs in to make a purchase from your site, they could just enter their phone number, rather than struggle to remember yet another password.

E asy on the eye

With everyone spending so long on their computers, it makes sense to put thought into a colour palette which is easy on the eye.

Some companies are thinking outside the extremes of dark and light and finding a middle ground in soft colour palettes, like pastel blues, warm browns, soft greens or light pinks. Designers know these colours are less jarring than stark black and white, and naturally induce calm and relaxation.

By contrast, dark mode might not immediately seem to be easy on the eye. This continuing trend looks sleek and stylish, but it also has the advantage that it can be better for users’ vision as it reduces harmful blue light, which in turn reduces headaches and eye strain.

Happy design

The health crisis of 2020 and 2021 has led to a focus on positivity and happy web designs. Companies are adopting softer, happier and even funny visuals to relieve the tensions of the last year and bring a bit of joy back into our lives.

Incorporating nature, blue skies and optimistic imagery into your design can help customers to see your brand in a really positive light.

‘ No code’

Code is behind all websites, but in 2021, code is becoming much simpler, meaning far more people can get involved in web design. This is essential for small and new businesses which want to make an impact in the online world, but don’t have the budget for a complex website.

With ‘no code’ design (actually just reduced code rather than no code at all), writers can become web designers, designers can become front-end developers and small businesses can take the plunge into ecommerce.

No code removes the boundaries between non-designers, designers and developers, enabling them to work together more collaboratively to grow new and small businesses.

As we all move into (hopefully) a post-pandemic world, website design for 2021 reflects the changes society and business have been through and will keep going through in the foreseeable future.

Web design in 2021 is less like something we would see in a science fiction film and more about the experiences we would encounter in real life, away from the screen. As websites are such a huge part of everyday life, good web design is making them more real and easier to use than ever.

Eleven top tips for businesses that want to use TikTok

Thu, 18 Mar 2021 11:47:18 GMT

Video sharing app TikTok was the most downloaded app of 2020, with 2.6 billion downloads worldwide by the end of the year. It had 8.5 million users in the UK in 2020 and this is expected to rise to 10.9 million in 2021.

TikTok is already one of the most popular social media platforms ever and is still growing fast. If you get it right, it is a great way to engage with an audience and potentially reach millions of people. But for many people over the age of 30 it remains a mystery, so you can be forgiven for not knowing much about it and not understanding how it can work for your business.

TikTok is hugely popular with Generation Z (16-24 year olds), with 40% of users falling into that age bracket. The remaining users are largely made up of younger teenagers or millennials in their 20s and 30s, so it is a great way to target a younger audience.

TikTok is all about videos of between 15 and 60 seconds. It is a fun tool, which shows a less polished side to your brand, but can still drive traffic to your website.

While TikTok is mainly thought of as an app about singing and dancing, that’s not the only thing it’s used for! Anyone can use TikTok, and singing, dance or video experience definitely aren’t required.

As with most other forms of social media, TikTok users can follow others, like content, comment on it and share it to other platforms like Instagram and Facebook, which is a great way to get your business seen by a bigger audience.

So what are our top tips for businesses that want to use TikTok?

Spend time on the app before you actually start using it

Before you dive in and create your first videos, spend some time on TikTok to get a feel for it. It is a good idea to create a personal profile to play with before setting up your business profile.

There are two main areas of TikTok – the For You page and the Following page. When you open the app, you will be taken to the For You page (FYP). This is where you will see trending videos and top creators. As you start to follow people, you will see more content. But one of the important factors about TikTok is that you don’t actually need to follow anyone to get a good user experience.

The Following page will show you the latest videos from the TikTokers you follow.

If you tap the magnifying glass at the bottom of the screen you will find the Discover page, where you can see the top trending videos, users and hashtags. Use this to follow hashtags to find out what other businesses, including your competitors, are doing. Is there a gap in the market that you can fill with your own TikTok content?

Take time to understand what works, how users interact and how your business can fit in with that naturally.

The more time you spend immersing yourself in TikTok, the better you will understand it and how it can work for your business.

Be authentic

TikTok isn’t about being polished, it’s about being yourself and showing the true personality of your brand to help users connect and relate to your business. And the good news is that you don’t need fancy equipment to create TikToks. In fact, it’s frowned on by users to create content which appears too perfect. TikTok users simply create content on their phones (make sure they are vertical, not horizontal).

It might feel at first that TikTok is only singing and dancing, but there is a niche for everyone. TikTok is all about the trends – some of which come and go in a matter of days. Keep an eye on your EYP to see what the latest trends are and work out a way to tap into them, while also maintaining your own authenticity.

While trends are key to TikTok, there is also no harm in trying something new and letting your personality and brand shine. Even more ‘serious’ businesses need to aim for content that is fun, but that doesn’t mean it should be completely out of your comfort zone and not in keeping with your brand.

Ideas which could work for your business include:

An introduction to yourself
A day in the life of your workplace
A tour of the workplace
Meet the team
Meet your pets
How to use your products
Shout-out to other small businesses

U se music and filters

Music and filters are a really fundamental part of TikTok – even if you’re not singing or dancing.

The app has almost every popular song available to use, without copyright issues. It’s easy to browse and add music to your videos by tapping the Sounds button at the top of the screen.

Effects include speeding up or slowing down videos. Speeding up is great for things like recipes, DIY, makeover or organisation/ tidying videos.

Filters give you access to different screen colours and contrast levels, while effects will add moving icons to your videos.

Spend time playing around with filters, have fun and find out what works best for your business.

Post regularly

Some TikTok users post videos several times a day. That is unlikely to be possible for most businesses, and the risk is that you will quickly run out of content ideas, but it is important to post regularly. Posting three to five times a week is a good place to start.

Like other forms of social media, TikTok’s algorithm rewards consistency – making your videos visible to more people if you post regularly.

If you’re worried that you might run out of content ideas, it’s a good idea to plan out a content calendar with ideas for the coming week and month. With TikTok trends constantly evolving and changing, it wouldn’t make much sense to plan further ahead than this.

Once you find the sort of content which resonates with your audience and you get used to putting videos together more quickly, you may decide to start posting even more often.

S hare your videos

Once you’ve posted a video, how do you know anyone will actually see it? This is a particularly big question if you are just starting out on TikTok or just starting to market to Gen Z.

Of course you could get lucky and your video might be creative enough, funny enough or tap into a trend brilliantly enough to go viral. But the reality is, you will need to put some work into sharing your videos.

The good news is that you can share your TikToks to other social media, like Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp. If someone enjoys your video, they can share it on their social media too, helping you to reach a much wider audience.

You can also link to your TikTok on any newsletters or emails you send out.

Your audience doesn’t even need to have the app themselves to be able to view your content, so your customers can still check out what you have created.

Use hashtags

One effortless way to share your videos on TikTok is by using hashtags.

Hashtags are part of the caption on TikTok videos and the whole caption is restricted to 150 characters, so it is essential to get your hashtags spot-on and not waste characters on anything irrelevant. To give you some idea of relevant hashtags for your video, type a broad keyword into the search function on TikTok and it will come up with some related hashtags.

There are two types of hashtags – general and specific. General hashtags are more generic and can help you reach a larger number of people who have a general interest in your subject matter.

Specific hashtags will help you focus on the people most likely to enjoy your content and buy your products and services. If your business is operating in a particular geographical area, it is important to include this as one of your hashtags too eg #gloucestershire or #tewkesbury.

Ideally, it is best to use both specific and general hashtags in your TikToks.

Some popular TikTok hashtags for business include:

#motivationalvideo
#howto (any tutorial ‘how to’ video)
#fitness
#foodrecipe
#smallbusinesstips
#beautyblogger

J oin hashtag challenges

The key reason for using TikTok as a business is to get your business noticed. Hashtag challenges help you do just that through participation and interaction with other TikTok users.

Hashtag challenges are a lot of fun and great way for your brand to be seen by users and other businesses.

In a hashtag challenge, a user challenges others to make and post a particular sort of video and to tag them using a specific hashtag. These are often dancing or lip syncing challenges, but could also be something like making a particular recipe.

There are usually lots of different hashtag challenges floating around at the same time, so it shouldn’t be too difficult to find one which is relevant, and to get involved.

If there is a hashtag challenge in your niche, it’s important to join in straightaway (before the trend is over) and show your take on it. Your brand and personality will help you to stand out from others taking part in the challenge.

Have a go at a few, then consider creating your own. Start small by challenging a handful of users to tackle your #hashtagchallenge. If they have fun doing it and challenge a few of their friends to try it too, it can easily snowball.

Suddenly people who have never even heard of your brand before are engaging with it because you’ve challenged them to show you their office organising tips.

Children and animals

They say to never work with children and animals because they always cause chaos. On TikTok, that sort of chaos is positively encouraged. Children and animals provide just the level of cuteness, fun and unpredictability that TikTok users are looking for.

So get your children and your pets involved – and see if your team want to get theirs involved too. The more the merrier!

Don’t forget to use a relevant hashtag on your videos like #dogsoftiktok – which users search for when they’re looking for a cute puppy to put a smile on their faces.

W ork with influencers

Just as there are influencers on Instagram, there are also influencers on TikTok. Some of them are celebrities, but there are also plenty of normal people who have built up a large following on TikTok.

TikTok influencers will have different niches and different follower numbers, meaning different levels of influence.

As a brand, you can approach relevant TikTok influencers to propose a working partnership to help improve your own following. Obviously it is important that they are relevant to your brand, so a beauty influencer wouldn’t be a good fit for an educational brand, even if they do have a really good following.

Some ways an influencer may promote your brand include:

Using your product in a video
Talking about your product in a video
Linking to your brand in the video description
Posting about the brand in the description

Generally, the more followers they have, the more expensive they will be. But if you find an influencer working in the right niche whose personality is a good fit with your brand’s values, there is potential for a really good return on investment.

As TikTok is still relatively new, working with a TikTok influencer is likely to work out cheaper than working with an Instagram influencer and will be more effective at reaching the Gen Z market.

Use TikTok advertising

While TikTok is mainly about the organic reach, it is also possible to use paid advertising on the app. There are a number of advertising options, which offer precise targeting, so you can make sure your ads are reaching the users who would be interested in your products or services.

As it is still a relatively new tool, advertising on TikTok is a good option for companies which want to reach the 16-24 market and to grow their brand on a platform that isn’t yet overrun by competitors.

The four current ways to advertise on TikTok are:

Turning your existing hashtag challenges into promoted content, so they reach more people.
TikTok branded lenses, which are similar to the effects on Snapchat, and Instagram and give users a way to interact with a brand by playing with their filter, making them more aware of the brand and its products.
In-feed video advertising - videos of up to 15 seconds which appear whilst users explore posted content.
A brand takeover could put your business in front of potentially millions of users. It is a full-screen ad which is displayed when the user first opens the app, so is very hard to ignore!

Get a TikTok pro account

Anyone can use a TikTok pro account and it is important that you use one right from the start.

A pro account is helpful to track TikTok analytics and see what sort of content appeals to users and what doesn’t work as well. It will also give you insight into things like when your audience is most active, to help you work out the best time to post.

If you want to make TikTok work for your business, the key thing to remember is that, unlike your blog and other areas of the web, there is no evergreen content. TikTok is constantly changing and evolving and it is essential to move with the trends. If you can create your own trends, that’s even better!

Always stay focused on your audience and what they want to see, keep looking for inspiration, keep creating and keep posting, and you can make TikTok work for your business.

TikTok: A beginners’ guide for business

Thu, 04 Mar 2021 10:01:01 GMT

TikTok was the most downloaded app of 2020, with 2.6 billion downloads worldwide by the end of 2020. It had 8.5 million UK users in 2020, which is expected to rise to 10.9 million in 2021.

TikTok is already one of the most popular social media platforms ever and it is growing fast. If you get it right, it is a great way to engage with an audience and potentially reach millions of people.

If you’re wondering whether TikTok would be a good marketing tool for your business, you need to start by thinking about your target audience . If your target audience is already active on other social media channels, it is important to consider using TikTok to promote your business too.

W hat is TikTok? Who uses it and what do they use it for?

TikTok is a video sharing app. It is a great platform for fun, original, and sharable content – and you don’t even need to be a ‘fun’ business to get on board with it.

Before you make a start, ask yourself these important questions:

How can you incorporate TikTok into your existing marketing plan?
Who is the target audience?
What exactly are your promoting?
How will people find and view your content?

TikTok is all about videos of between 15 and 60 seconds. It is a fun tool, which shows a less polished side to your brand, but can still drive traffic to your site.

While for many it is about singing and dancing, that’s not the only thing it’s used for! Anyone can use TikTok – with no singing, dance or video experience required.

Like most other apps and social networks, TikTok users can follow other users, like content, comment on it and share to other platforms – which is a great way to get your business seen by a bigger audience.

N ot all singing and dancing

Even if your brand isn’t well-known, you can still use TikTok for your business. But you have to make sure that you are posting quality content that doesn’t look like a sales pitch. The worst thing you can do when starting out on TikTok is just post a series of your ads or pictures of your products. Anything which looks stiff, formal or corporate is a complete no-no and will have users scrolling past without a second glance.

If your business is a small local one, that doesn’t mean you can’t use TikTok. When you post a TikTok it gets shared with people in your local area – the people it will resonate with and who are most likely to buy from you. So you don’t have to be a big business to have a big reach where you want it.

Offering answers, motivation or information can bring you TikTok success. It has worked for brands in the education and training sectors, as well as entrepreneurs and lifestyle bloggers. The one thing they have in common is that they have found a way to strike the balance between informative and fun - to create content that people want to watch.

From educational videos to recipes, ‘how-tos’ or beauty transformations, there are many ways to use TikTok for your brand. With a bit of clever editing or the use of time-lapse video on your smartphone, you can show users exactly how to use your products. This instantly makes them more appealing than your competition, because your audience is able to visualise exactly how they would use the product themselves.

TikTok doesn’t have to be polished, like Instagram or YouTube. In fact, users don’t want to see perfection – they want to see real and they want to see fun. Revealing the true personality behind your business in this way will help users to feel a connection with your brand, which builds trust.

Whether a workout transformation or a lifestyle hack, it is just as important to keep viewers intrigued by the content of your video as it is to get your marketing message across.

Maybe you already have a big audience or customer base among Generation Z (16-24 year olds) or maybe you want to reach that audience. TikTok is a great way to do it, with 40% of users aged 16-24. The remaining users are largely made up of younger teenagers or millennials in their 20s and 30s.

While they won’t work in every situation, two magic ingredients to TikTok videos are animals and children. Animals and children give just the right balance of humour, cuteness and unpredictability. So don’t be afraid to bring your pets or your kids in on the action. And don’t forget to use a relevant hashtag on your videos like #dogsoftiktok – which users search for when they’re looking for a canine pick-me-up.

T rends and hashtags

While creating your own original content is a good idea, you may find your videos get more attention if you try out some TikTok trends and add your own brand and personality to them. It doesn’t matter if your videos are imperfect – in fact, that is generally preferable on TikTok.

Throw yourself in and put your own spin on the latest TikTok trend. Your personality and your brand will help differentiate you from similar businesses and videos.

Hashtag challenges are a big part of TikTok’s appeal, so consider taking part in a few – whether that is learning a dance routine, showing off your tips for organising the office or your kitchen, or cooking up your own version of a dish from your favourite restaurant.

And once you’ve got used to joining in with others’ challenges, why not set your own hashtag challenge?

Whether or not your video is part of a hashtag challenge, it is essential to use hashtags because, without them, your videos will only reach your followers. If you use hashtags, you have the potential to reach a huge number of users.

There are broadly two types of hashtags – general and specific. General hashtags can help you reach a larger number of people who have a general interest in your subject matter. Specific hashtags will help you zone in on the people who are most likely to enjoy your content and buy your products and services. Ideally, it is a good idea to include both sorts of hashtag in your TikToks.

Some popular TikTok hashtags for business include:

#howto (any tutorial ‘how to’ video)
#motivationalvideo
#fitness
#foodrecipe
#5mincraft
#beautyblogger

It’s important to use the right hashtags to reach your audience because TikTok restricts captions to 150 characters, including hashtags. So don’t waste characters by using an #irrelevanthashtag.

Want to know how well your videos are reaching your audience? Make sure you have a TikTok pro account, which any user can enable. This will give you access to analytics, including insights on weekly and month views, follower growth and trending videos.

P aid advertising

So far we have talked about the organic reach of TikTok. But it is also possible to use paid advertising on TikTok, in the same way as you might do on Facebook or Instagram. If your aim is to advertise to a very young audience, TikTok might be a better option for your advertising budget than other social media.

As it is still a relatively new tool, advertising on TikTok is a good option for brands which want to build a niche community on a platform that isn’t yet overrun by competitors.

Some ways of advertising on TikTok include turning your existing hastag challenges into promoted content, so that they reach more people.

TikTok branded lenses are similar to the effects on Snapchat and Instagram and include creative face filters and animated objects. They give users a way to interact with a brand by playing with their filter, which in turns makes users more aware of the brand and its products. Using branded lenses and hashtag challenges together creates an even stronger link to your brand.

Another possibility is in-feed video advertising - videos of up to 15 seconds which appear whilst users explore posted content. This type of advertising is ideal to gain exposure and can be used to redirect people towards a specific web page or hashtag challenge.

The final option is a brand takeover, which could put your business in front of potentially millions of users. It is a full-screen ad which is displayed when the user first opens Tik Tok, so it is very hard to ignore!

If your target audience is young people and you’re not currently using TikTok for your business, you are missing a trick, because it could be your best bet for leads and conversions. Younger people often have short attention spans and are always on the go – and constantly tapping in and out of TikTok.

With TikTok’s short video format, you are more likely to have their attention for the full duration of the video , rather than them moving on before they’ve even reached your key message, as they might do with YouTube.

If you have an older demographic, but want to extend your reach to people in their teens and 20s, TikTok would also be a great tool to help your business reach that target audience.

It is very cheap and easy to use, so why not give it a go and see what TikTok can do for your business?

Web design ideas to suit every business

Tue, 16 Feb 2021 13:10:06 GMT

Creating a website for your business is a huge step. It is a blank canvas with which to showcase your brand to the right audience. You want to stand out and you want to appeal to potential customers. But where do you start?

Your website has literally a second or two to create the right impression. If a visitor doesn’t instantly see what they are looking for, they will leave. The most effective websites are those which are both visually appealing and easy to use.

There is a huge range of options for website designs, but many of them fall into a small number of broad categories:

Clean and modern
Vintage and classic
Fun and friendly

These basic categories should give you some inspiration and help to get your ideas flowing.

Each of these categories will lend themselves to a style of font which will enhance your brand. Choosing the right category of font for your brand eg sans-serif, serif, decorative or script can make or break your design.

These typefaces all have ‘personalities’ to enhance your design. They can be serious and professional, loud and flamboyant or interesting and quiet. Some fonts are flexible and seem to adapt depending on their surroundings – particularly your colour palette and images.

Here at Cotswold Web, we’ve got lots of good ideas about what works well for different industries and sectors. Talk to us about your ideas and we will talk to you about how we can make them work…

C lean and modern design

Clean, clear modern web design has been popular for a few years now. There’s a good reason for that – it works! It is easy to navigate and easy for a visitor to take in all of the relevant information.

When you initially had a website in mind, this was probably the first design option you considered.

Clean and modern web design has minimalist layout, intuitive navigation, uncomplicated sans-serif fonts and a ‘flat’ feel to it.

It is more formal than some web designs, so is used in professional services fields, like accountancy, law or surveying. It is also popular for technology companies and in education.

This design will stop visitors from getting confused about what you have to offer, as it sets it out very clearly. A grid system with icons and short paragraphs makes it easy for visitors to find what they are looking for and get the answers to the questions they may have about your business.

V intage and classic web design

With a muted palette and a font that comes straight out of your grandma’s diary, classic and vintage web designs bring the warmth and familiarity of bygone years to the 21 ^st century.

These designs are perfect for any business which is a bit retro – such as a barber’s shop, tattoo parlour, vintage clothing brand or artisan baker.

These websites achieve their vintage look with old-fashioned photos, an off-white background, aged textures and classic fonts. They show that your business likes to pay attention to detail and take care over its work – just like they did in the old days!

When so many companies are opting for clean and modern website designs, retro designs are a way to help your business stand out from the crowd.

F un and friendly design

If you are running a restaurant or takeaway, are in the hospitality or entertainment business, are a small scale or niche food producer or are providing products or services for children, you many want to opt for more of a fun design.

You can make your website fun and friendly using bright colours, interesting fonts, infographics and cheerful and comical illustrations.

These ideas will also work for businesses in any sector which want to appear to be friendly and approachable.

Illustrations and even fonts which appear hand drawn will show your visitors that your business likes to have fun and not take itself too seriously.

M ake it work

Once you’ve chosen the basic look of your site, you need to focus on the other key element of the design – making it work for a user. This is the user experience, or UX as it is more commonly known.

Know your audience - you should have a good idea of the target audience for your website and the design should meet their needs. Although every brand is unique, you can take some cues from your competition here – if your target audience likes your competition’s website, design something with a similar layout and features. When you use a design that your audience is already comfortable with, it will help to ease them into your site. You can differentiate your business from the competition with your products and services.

Make it easy to scan – you may think people will read your website, but the reality is that they will actually just scan it. So make it easy for them! Infographics and visuals are the quickest and easiest way to share instructions or data with your audience.

Don’t be too creative – you want your design to look good, but don’t overdo it to the detriment of the functionality. Making users think too hard about how your site works isn’t a risk worth taking. You should aim for a familiar looking layout, where standard objects like links clearly stand out, and login access is located on the top right of the screen.

Make it clear - decide what you want users to do, make it easy for them and definitely don’t hide action buttons. Keep your pages uncluttered and target them at the majority of users – you can make extra functionality discoverable for the minority who really need it.

What is the focal point? – you want your visitor’s eye to be drawn to the most important elements on your page, so you need to think carefully about the layout of each page (sometimes call the visual hierarchy). There are many ways to create a visual hierarchy – including use of colour (bright colours attract more attention than muted ones), size and scale (that is the size of an element in relation to other elements of the page). Making the focal point bigger or brighter than anything else will make your visitor more likely to take the action you want them to take.

Every business wants website visitors to stick around and ultimately convert to customers. To do this, they need to feel a connection with your brand and your products. Take the time to create a website which really reflects your brand and products, and connects with your audience to improve your chances of success.

Web design, UI, UX and web development: What are the differences?

Wed, 27 Jan 2021 12:39:04 GMT

Whether you are looking for a brand new website for your business or an update to your existing website, it can be hard to decide who should do the job.

Is there a difference between web design and web development? Or are they just different words for the same thing? And what about the difference between UI and UX?

If you’ve never had a website designed before, you might find the words a little confusing and overwhelming. It’s like the whole tech industry is speaking a completely different language. But if you are going to be working with a web professional to come up with a website for your business, it’s good to be prepared and to know what at least some of the terminology actually means.

To help you out, here we will take a closer look at these four key terms: web design, web development, UX and UI. After reading this, you should have a much clearer idea about what each of them means, and also which one you need your business to focus on most.

T he basics

Before we look at them more closely, these are the basic definitions of the four areas:

Web design is an umbrella category for everything to do with designing both the look and useability of a website. Both UI and UX are a part of web design.
Web development is the technical part of creating a website, focusing on code. It can be divided into ‘front-end’ and ‘back-end’ development.
User experience (UX) is a specialist area of design dealing with user behaviour when using a website or app.
User interface (UI) is a part of web design which deals specifically with the controls people use to interact with a website or app.

Separating the four individual areas isn’t always easy, as there is a lot of crossover between them. The internet is constantly evolving, and so are the jobs which support it. The key isn’t so much about which area handles a particular task, but more about the way in which the four areas consider the task from a different point-of-view.

An example of this is the common problem of website loading time. Each area will consider it in a different way to come up with a solution.

If a page takes a long time to load, there’s either too much content or the content is too complex. A web designer will spend time adjusting and re-exporting assets, compressing image files and trimming pages of excess content to speed up the site.

A web developer would come at things from a different angle and try better file compression to reduce the file sizes of the content, CSS sprites to save bandwidth or a content delivery network to speed up loading times.

The focus for a UI designer would be on making sure the controls are as responsive as possible. They would want to ensure the interface is simple enough for interactivity to be instantaneous.

The likelihood of a user leaving your site after a few seconds (bounce) increases for every additional second a site takes to load. So a UX expert would prioritise reducing the load time on the home and landing pages first, before dealing with the issue across the whole site.

In an ideal world, you would hire all four of these roles to work on your site. But the reality is that would be too expensive for many businesses, especially start-up companies. So the likelihood is that you will choose one or two areas to focus on more than the others, or hire someone who has skills in all of the areas.

If your site is a fairly simple one, hiring a designer who can code would be a good place to start. Some UI designers have overlapping skills with web designers, while others have skills in both UI and UX.

You should also consider whether your main focus is a website or an app, and the distinction between your desktop site and mobile site. Every designer and developer will have their own speciality, so make sure you hire someone who can meet your requirements.

Most web designers work mainly on websites rather than apps. So, if you are looking for a designer for iOS or Android apps, you will most likely need to find a UX or UI designer.

Which specialist can help with your particular business goals? And what should you consider when hiring them? Here we take a closer look at each of the specialities…

Web design

Fundamentally, web design is all about the visual appearance and functionality of a website. It’s a field which has its roots in graphic design. If a web designer has been in the job for a long time, it is likely that they initially got into web design through graphic design.

There are a number of subcategories of web design, including both UX and UI, but also CRO (conversion rate optimisation) and IA (information architecture, which deals with site mapping and navigation).

But web design is so much more than graphic design. Whether working with websites or apps, designers need to understand and keep up to date with technical constraints, functionality, user expectations and digital trends.

Web designers also need to understand business, so that their designs can encourage visitors to take the right actions. They need to know about digital sales tactics and how site layout influences user behaviour.

The web designer handles the traditional graphic design side of things, like colour and font. He or she may also create icons and graphics from scratch to help create your online brand identity.

The design process usually involves a web designer coming up with a number of ideas and prototypes for a client to test and approve. Once they have come up with a design you are happy with, it is passed to the developer for coding.

Checklist for hiring a web designer:

They don’t need to be the ‘best’ designer, but they do need to be the best fit for your business
Every designer has their own style, so look at their portfolio. Does it meet with your expectations for your brand?
Is their preferred software compatible with the software used by the rest of the team?
Can they meet your deadlines and fit in with your schedule?

W eb development

The big difference between a web designer and a web developer is the use of code. Web developers use the most confusing language, but you don’t need to understand most of it. All that really matters is that they know what they are talking about!

Web development is divided into two main areas – front-end and back-end.

The front-end is the client side of a website. The code used for the front-end is what brings the appearance of the website to life. The front-end developer will work closely with the designer to make the design vision a reality. As we said earlier, there is a lot of crossover between all of the roles, so sometimes the web designer will also handle the development of the front-end.

The back-end is the server side of a website. The back-end developer works on the digital system of resources on a server, coding the data in the database and optimising how it is delivered. Without the back-end work, there would be no front-end.

There are also full-stack developers who can work on both front-end and back-end development. They are a good option for start-ups and smaller companies who can’t afford to pay too much for their web development.

Checklist for hiring a web developer:

It doesn’t matter if you understand the language, but tell a developer what you would like and listen to their recommendations
Check their portfolio – do their previous designs work in the way you would like your site to work?
Can your developer work with your designer? If some design ideas aren’t possible, you can save time if the developer lets the designer know from the start

User experience (UX)

UX is web design with the focus on the user’s perspective. It is all about understanding the why. Why does a visitor click on the red button instead of the blue one? Why hasn’t the user filled out the form? Why don’t they scroll to the bottom of the page?

UX considers how the layout of a web page affects a visitor. UX designers can come up with page designs which are more likely to encourage users to make a purchase or sign up for something.

Although it may seem like you don’t need a UX designer when you already have a web designer, there is a direct correlation between good UX design and meeting your business goals. Optimising the design of a website can encourage people to take certain actions and create an atmosphere which is more conducive to that happening.

UX designers use a lot of graphic design skills – like using colour for emotion, attracting attention with the size and placement of images and creating a flow across a page and through your site which is easy to follow.

Checklist for hiring a UX designer:

If you don’t have the budget for a separate UX designer, ask candidates in other fields if they can handle UX in addition to their main expertise.
Test drive other sites and apps they have worked on. Are they easy and enjoyable to use?

U ser interface (UI)

User interface (UI) means creating something we can all use without thinking about it. Can you remember when you learned that the bin icon meant delete? Exactly!

If the UI designer does their job well and creates a really intuitive interface, users don’t even have to think about how to use it. Which is what all businesses really want from their own websites.

If a user has to search for a button or spend time thinking about how to use the controls, the UI design isn’t fit for purpose. The goal is to create self-explanatory controls that users can understand at a glance.

UX isn’t in competition with UI – the two need to work closely together to achieve the best outcomes for your business.

UI designers focus on:

The layout of a screen - how should information be organised? How much space is needed between different elements?
Responsive design – making sure the design works across all screen sizes.
Designing the essential icons, buttons, sliders and scrollbars.
Designing the interactions - how does a button react when a visitor clicks on it?

UI designers also need to find the right balance between providing a big range of options and not cluttering the screen. That’s where techniques like hover controls and pull-out menus come in. It is up to the UI designer to decide which controls should be there at all times and which can be hidden.

Checklist for hiring a UI designer:

Test drive their previous sites - can you find everything you need? Was the site or app easy to use?
Make sure the UI designer has worked in your industry or for your type of project. The ‘best’ UI designer might not be the best for you.

What does your business need?

In an ideal world, every business would have a brilliant website, designed by a developer, designer, UI and UX experts. But the reality is that is too expensive for many companies, especially start-ups. Perhaps you already have a website which is already functioning reasonably well, but you suspect it could do a bit better?

In either case, you may want to enlist the help of one or two experts to improve things. There is nothing to say that a web designer is ‘better’ or more important than a UI designer. While start-ups and tech companies in particular often prioritise UI and UX designers, the right person for the job is the right person for your business. And that won’t be the same person as it is for someone else’s business, even in the same sector.

To help you understand which one your business needs, here are some examples of issues which each area can help you to resolve. If you already have a website, carry out some user tests to find out where people have problems on your site.

Web design

Website doesn’t look right on mobile devices
Website design looks out-of-date
Visitors aren’t going to the pages you want them to
Images are poor quality
Time spent on a page is too short

Web development

Site functions aren’t working as they should
Site goes offline too often
Some content fails to load
Too many 404 errors
Assistance with web security and hack prevention

High bounce rate (visitors leave very quickly
Poor conversion rates (high levels of traffic, but few conversions
Users leave after one page, rather than staying and exploring

Complaints about being unable to do things or find things
Poor navigation
Lack of social sharing options
Lack of customisation options

We hope this article makes the differences between web design, web development, UI and UX a bit clearer. We are sure that you will now realise that, while there are differences between the disciplines, there are also a lot of similarities and a lot of crossover.

Finding the right web professional to work on your site is really a matter of identifying what your key issues are, then checking the portfolios of a number of professionals to make sure you find one who understands your business and your needs.

How to UX your website

Mon, 18 Jan 2021 14:06:14 GMT

The UX of your website is the user experience. It is how a visitor sees your website, how they use it and how they remember it later.

With every website, you want to be sure that the UX is as good as it can possibly be – because that’s what will encourage people to spend time there, get to know your brand and ultimately become customers.

A landing page that works

Many of your visitors will arrive at your site through a landing page. So that landing page has to instantly sell your business and keep their interest. It should be neither boring nor complicated and overwhelming.

So make sure you give them a great first impression, which should meet with their expectations of your brand. And don’t give them too much information without helping them to take the next steps.

Depending how it fits with your brand, a good landing page should be a large and striking image (or a video running in the background), with minimalist design and a clear call to action.

As an added bonus, if your landing page is good enough to keep people hanging round for longer, that’s good news for your Google ranking too.

Keep words to a minimum

‘A picture says a thousand words’, so do you really need all of those words on your site? Give your images space to breathe and make sure your visitors’ attention is drawn to the words that really matter.

Images and videos go a long way in helping establish your brand identity and building your relationship with your visitors. For most businesses, the best UX will come from a 70% visual (pictures, video), 30% content (words, links etc) rule.

Too many words risks visitors reading the less important words on your site. There is also a big risk of visitors getting bored and leaving quickly.

So keep your words and sentences precise and concise. And don’t restrict yourself to overly formal language in a bid to sound professional. Use a friendly and chatty style to make your brand appear approachable.

Where you do have sections which are more text heavy (eg testimonials), break up the words with lots of white space (remember ‘white space’ doesn’t have to be white – it can be any colour!) and the use of headings and sub-headings.

S ubtle differences

If your website has a number of pages, you don’t want them all to look exactly the same. That makes it very hard to differentiate between them and can quickly become monotonous and boring. On the other hand, they have to be similar enough to make it clear that your website is all for the same brand.

So the key is subtle difference and finding the right balance between having enough variation and everything being identical.

One way of striking the balance is to vary the layout of your pages. Some layouts will lend themselves more readily to your blog, while others will work well for your product pages.

Ways to keep the consistency and ensure your brand identity stays strong include sticking with the same colour palette and fonts and the same navigation eg menu bar/ header throughout.

Use micro animations

They might not seem significant, as they are very small and subtle, but micro animations can discreetly encourage visitors to take the actions you want them to take.

When the user needs to act on something important, animating the actions will attract their attention. Start with a subtle animation and increase the intensity (change of size, colour or speed) depending on how important the action is.

A good animation uses transitions like push left or slide up to show the content on a detail screen. Other ideas include lists which ‘fall’ into place one item at a time or animations which push other content out of the way, perhaps when a reader scrolls through your page.

Animation on a call to action (CTA) button can show in a more visual way that the action has been completed – maybe by colours moving along or darkening or even a ‘success’ message appearing on the button.

Use micros animations sparingly and only for the most important actions. If you use too many, they lose their impact.

U se live chat

If a visitor is confused and not sure where to go or what to do next, there is no better way to help them than through live chat. Live chat addresses and deals with these problems there and then.

A good chatbot will make your website lively and interactive and also shows that you are responsive to your customers’ needs. What better way to UX your website?

There are also some hidden bonuses of live chat, which will help you as much as they help your visitors. Live chat has a good lead capture rate and can also give you useful user feedback and even opportunities for new work and projects.

Be careful with the pop-ups

There is a place for pop-up forms on a website, but too many of them, or having them appear at the wrong time, is definitely not good for UX.

In fact, badly designed pop-ups will block a visitor’s view of your page and interrupt what they are doing. This is often even worse on mobile sites, where it can completely obliterate the view.

So think carefully before using a pop-up on your site. Is it really relevant? Can you use an alternative?

If a pop-up still seems like the right option, make sure:

It offers something valuable and relevant to the visitor
It doesn’t ruin the mobile experience
It is a good fit with the way people already engage with your site
It uses language which is specific, actionable and easy to relate to

If you haven’t yet taken these actions on your website, spend a little time on it to update and improve your UX. It will definitely be time well spent, which your visitors and customers will appreciate, and could lead to an improved impact on your bottom line.

What are landing pages and how do they work?

Wed, 13 Jan 2021 10:24:43 GMT

A landing page is a page on your website which is specifically designed to convert visitors into leads.

It performs a completely different role to other pages on your site and follows these two fundamental criteria:

It has a form for you to capture a visitor’s information in exchange for an offer
Its only purpose is to convert visitors into leads

A landing page has no distractions and no navigation to other pages on your site. It is very clear and easy for a visitor to use and fill in your form. So while a home page might include a form, it isn’t a landing page as it serves other purposes too.

A landing page is an exchange of valuable information and is a win-win both for your business and a prospective customer.

A visitor will fill out the form on your landing page because they are getting something useful from you – that could be an ebook, bonus video content, a how-to guide or something else. And your business is also getting something useful from them – their contact details which you can use for future marketing.

Why your business needs landing pages

Why do you need landing pages? Why can’t you just use your other pages rather than create separate pages just for generating leads?

You may need a lot of landing pages, which take time to create, so it could be tempting not to bother with them. But the reality is that landing pages are an essential part of marketing for any business, organisation or charity with a website.

A website has three main aims:

To attract new visitors to your business
To draw those visitors in by telling your story in a compelling or emotional way
To convert those visitors into leads

Landing pages are far more effective at capturing leads than the home page. They are the first step on a journey to find new customers for your business. They help you generate those important leads, moving them through your sales process and ultimately turning them into customers.

But many companies still send their prospective customers to their home page rather than a dedicated landing page. This makes some sense, as the home page gives visitors a whole range of options – product pages, your blog, your contact details and information about the history of your company to name but a few.

But having too many choices means your visitors aren’t taking the steps you want them to take. And visitors need some guidance too – they want to find what they are looking for quickly. The home page and all of its options can prove to be overwhelming.

A landing page will give them exactly what they want, when they want it, with a minimum of confusion. That’s why landing pages are so essential for turning visitors into leads and why your business really needs them.

H ow landing pages work

Landing pages follow a simple and straightforward path:

Someone see a call to action (eg on your ads or social media) and ends up on a landing page
They fill in the form on your landing page – so they convert from visitor to lead
Their information from the form is stored on your leads database
You market to them based on what you know about them from the form

If you use a marketing automation tool, you will be able to see which offer a visitor (the lead) converted on and when, as well as what other interactions they have had on your site. This valuable information will help you target the lead with the offers, products and services they are most likely to be interested in.

If you show them the right information, your leads are far more inclined to move onto the next stage of your marketing funnel – getting ever closer to become a customer. The better your targeting and the more quickly you can move leads through the marketing funnel, the better the return on your investment will be.

If you don’t use a marketing automation tool (and it would certainly be worth considering using one if you don’t), as a minimum your landing page has helped you acquire a new name and email address for your leads database.

T he buyer persona

Before you go on to create your landing page, you need to know who it is for. You should have an ideal customer in mind and the landing page should meet the needs of that customer – the buyer persona.

You can build up a clear picture of your buyer persona through current customer data and any market research you have done. A good buyer persona will give you a clear insight into your customers’ behaviour, their interests and values and how they think. The better your buyer persona, the more able you will be to create content which is valuable to them.

Some businesses may have multiple buyer personas eg if you have a large product range or a number of different price points, but when creating a landing page you should target only one buyer persona at a time.

If you try to make your landing page work for all of the different buyer personas, it won’t appeal to all of them and will decrease your chances of a conversion. By targeting just one persona at a time, you will be much more focused, increasing the chances of conversion.

It doesn’t really matter exactly what the offer is (eg whether it is an ebook, a webinar or a tip sheet), the most important thing is that it meets the need of your buyer persona – solving a problem or ‘pain point’ they are experiencing.

When they set out to solve a problem or make a purchase, a potential customer goes on a journey from research through to the point of buying something. Different offers on different landing pages can be created for every stage of the journey, to help a visitor to become a customer.

Awareness stage – a visitor is aware of an issue or opportunity, but isn’t quite sure what the problem is. At this stage they are doing research to better understand their issue. Pieces of content to offer at the awareness stage include guides, white papers and ebooks.
Consideration stage – a person now fully understands the problem or opportunity they are faced with and wants to understand more about how they can solve it. Offers for this stage would include videos and webinars.
Decision stage – at this stage, they are ready to go ahead with a purchase to resolve their issue. But they haven’t yet decided to use your company or your product. They are looking at a few businesses before making their final decision. Offering case studies, demo videos and product information (especially anything which makes your product unique, such as its environmental credentials) at this stage can help sway the decision-making in your direction.

T he conversion process

Landing pages are an essential part of the conversion process, but there are a number of elements that need to work together to ensure a successful conversion.

Calls to action (CTAs) – a call to action is a link that asks your visitors to carry out an action. The link could appear as an image or a line of text. It will most likely be a CTA that brings a visitor to your landing page in the first place – perhaps from your ads or social media. CTAs can and should also be found elsewhere on your website to drive visitors to the landing page, for example from a relevant page on your blog. The more relevant the CTA is to your landing page, the more likely a visitor is to convert.

Once on your landing page, it is another CTA which will tell a visitor what they have to click to access the offer.

Landing page – this is where a visitor fills in a form, giving you the valuable information you need, which means they can access the offer eg ebook, bonus video content or a webinar.

Thank you page – rather than a ‘thank you’ line on your landing page, move your lead onto a dedicated thank you page. This is where they can actually download the offer they have signed up for. It is also an opportunity to continue to engage with them and move them further down your marketing funnel. Can you make a secondary offer available to them at this point, such as case studies or a webinar? These secondary offers should be made through another form.

P utting your landing page together

Although a landing page may appear to be simple and rather brief, it is essential that it includes the right elements to grab the attention of a visitor and stop them form leaving.

Headline – this needs to be compelling and make your visitor want to keep reading. It is the first thing they will see when they get to your landing page and it has to be interesting enough to ensure it won’t be the last!

Sell your offer – a visitor needs to see almost at a glance (certainly within a few seconds) whether or not they are interested in your offer. So make it clear, concise and effective.

A good image – images always catch the eye and make people stop and pay attention, so make sure to include an image which is interesting and relevant.

No site navigation – make it hard to leave! You want people to focus fully on your offer, so remove any opportunities to get distracted and head for another interesting page on your site.

Bullet points – because most of us have short attention spans, bullet points make it a lot easier to take in the relevant information without getting bored or distracted. The bullet points should give enough information about your offer to tempt a visitor to convert.

Testimonials – include quotes, pictures or even videos of people who love your content on your landing page. This will make your page look more appealing and help improve your conversion rate.

T he right form for the right time

The form is the most important element of any landing page. Make sure it has a clear and concise instruction to encourage people to fill it out eg ‘To get your ebook, please fill in the form’.

The form will give you the essential information you need from a visitor, but if you ask for too much, you could end up with none at all. Conversion rates drop dramatically if forms have more than three fields, so keep them to a minimum, particularly early in the buyer’s journey.

The key thing to remember when putting your form together is that if you don’t know what you will do with the information you are requesting, you don’t need to ask for it! For example, if you aren’t planning to phone them or visit their website, don’t ask for this information on the form.

When considering a potential customer’s journey, you should ask for different information at different stages. At the awareness stage, you only need their name and email address. That is enough for you to make contact with them in future to nurture the lead.

At the consideration and decision stage, a person is more interested in what you have to offer. As they are further into their buyer journey, they are likely to be more open to giving you more information. This will benefit them in return, as you can better personalise the offers you give to them.

P romote your page

Having put work into creating your landing page, you need to promote it so that people will actually visit it. Some of the best ways to promote your page are:

Email – send an email to a targeted list of people who are most likely to be interested in your offer and to convert. The text and design of your email can be based on your landing page.
CTAs – use calls to action on your paid ads or on relevant pages of your own website. The CTA needs to be a good fit with the page on your site, as well as the landing page itself. Position it on relevant blogposts and pages on your site with high visitor numbers.
Social media – social media is a great way to spread the word about your content and to reach a new audience. Make sure you use the right social media for your buyer persona eg if they are more likely to be on Instagram than Facebook, it isn’t worth wasting resources on promoting via Facebook.

K eep testing

Once your landing page is live, you might think that your work is done. Can you just sit back and watch the leads roll in? While you could do that, we would definitely advise testing your landing page regularly to ensure it is really working for your potential customers.

The first thing you need to do is to get someone to click all the links, fill out the landing page and download your offer, to ensure it is all working smoothly.

But most importantly, you need to A/B test all of the elements of the page. Is your headline attracting attention? Is your form in the right place? Do you have the right number of boxes on your form? Do you have the right number of bullet points on your page? Does the page work better with or without testimonials?

Test each of these elements separately to see what (if any) effect it has on your conversions. If people react better to a shorter headline or a more colourful image, improve and optimise your landing page so that it will perform even better in future.

U se data

Of course, to be able to test and optimise your landing page, you need to track its data. Your data can show you how engaged your prospects are eg whether they have signed up for more than one of your offers. If so, they are likely to make a purchase soon.

The data will also show how well your offers are performing. You can check your conversion rates, time spent on the page, your bounce rate and the number of leads generated by your landing page.

Do some of your offers work better than others? What is the difference between them and can you amend your offers which aren’t working as well?

Use this data to create a benchmark for the performance of your own landing pages. If any of your landing pages are performing significantly below your benchmark, these are the pages you should optimise first.

Improving the performance of a highly visited but low performing landing page is one of the best things you can do to improve lead generation for your business.

Converting visitors into leads is the first step in creating a relationship between your business and a potential customer. Landing pages are one of the most effective ways of engaging with your leads and helping them to become customers. By investing time in your landing pages, you will be able to pick up essential information about your potential customers to help you to target them with improved offers in the future.

Facebook ads mistakes to avoid

Tue, 05 Jan 2021 12:08:17 GMT

Facebook is by far the biggest social media network out there, with nearly 51 million regular users in the UK alone. It also has one of the biggest and most effective online advertising platforms available.

Whatever you are selling and however big or small your business, it should benefit from using Facebook ads. Facebook ads are used by the biggest multinationals right down to the very smallest local companies. It can help you reach the people you want to do business with – and who are also interested in doing business with you.

But to get the results you want – whether that is brand awareness or an increase in sales – you need to put the work into creating successful Facebook advertising campaigns. If you get it right, you can get a very good return on your investment.

But how do you get it right? If you’ve never used Facebook ads before, it can seem like a daunting prospect. The money you spend on your advertising is coming straight off your bottom line and you need to see a return. But the reality is, you are unlikely to get it right first time and there is a certain amount of trial and error involved in creating and targeting the perfect ad campaign for the audience you want to reach.

Fortunately, plenty of other businesses have already made the mistakes so that you don’t need to. Read on to find out about some of the worst mistakes you can make when advertising on Facebook – and how to avoid them.

Not thinking about the end goal

The first step to creating a successful ad campaign on Facebook isn’t creating your ad. The first thing to do is actually to set your goal or objective. You need to be completely clear on this and you need to stick with it.

Facebook gives you a range of objectives to choose from, which can get confusing and you may get sidetracked into choosing the wrong one. But it is very important not to start designing your ad and its message until you are clear about your end goal.

What do you want to achieve from this ad?

Facebook offers 11 objectives to choose from:

Brand awareness – introduce your brand to a new audience

Reach – get your ad seen by as many people as possible

Engagement – reach a wide audience to increase your engagements or likes on Facebook

Traffic – drive visitors to a particular web page

Video views – get more people watching your videos

App installs – encourage people to install your app

Lead generation – encourage new people into your sales funnel

Conversions – encourage specific actions on your website, including sales or signing up for subscriptions

Messages – get people to contact your business through Facebook Messenger

Catalogue sales – link your ads to the product pages for the items people are most likely to buy

Store traffic – increase footfall to your bricks and mortar shop

Whatever your aim, your Facebook ads need to align with it right from the start. That way, you will be able to design more relevant advertising campaigns for the audience you want to connect with.

Choosing the right objective from the beginning will stop you wasting money on advertising which doesn’t work. It will also help you to create and run better Facebook ads in the future.

Using the wrong ad type

Facebook offers a range of different types of ads to choose from. This means there are a lot of ways to make your advertising successful, but also a lot of ways to get it wrong!

When choosing the right ad type, you need to focus on both the objective of your ads and what your own target audience would be most likely to engage with.

You should choose the ad format which closely aligns with your advertising objectives. Some of the most popular ad types are:

Single image – all objectives apart from video views

Carousel – all objectives except video views and engagement

Video – all objectives apart from catalogue sales

Collection – conversions, traffic, store traffic and catalogue sales

Slideshow – all objectives

Keep A/B testing your ads, to ensure you have chosen the right option for your business and its objectives.

Not testing individual variables

We have talked on this blog before about the value of A/B testing to find out what works and what doesn’t . Experimenting with different versions of your Facebook ads will help you understand what is the most effective.

But it can feel like a slow process and it is tempting to test too many things at once. This is a big mistake. If you test a lot of things at once, you won’t know whether it was the colour change, the image change or the different text which made the difference.

To really understand what works, you should only test one variable at a time, rather than testing multiple variables. So test a blue version and a red version to see which is more effective, before you move on to tweaking the images.

The other key thing to remember here is to test your variables with an equal audience. So if your target market is men aged 25-45 who work in supervisory and middle management roles for large companies, don’t target one variable at the 25-35 year olds and the other variable at the 35-45 year olds, because the audience isn’t equal.

In this case, if you get different results from your testing, you won’t know whether it is because you’ve changed the variables of your ad or because you’ve distorted your audience.

The good news is that Facebook Ads Manager makes it easy to test your ads, and you can actually test them on three different levels:

Advert set (placement, targeting etc)
Campaign (lead generation, conversion etc)
Ad (links, image etc)

But while testing is an integral part of a successful Facebook ad campaign, you need to be sure of your method, or it won’t work. Knowing what you want to test and when is the only way to find out what really works. From there, you can optimise your adverts to ensure a better return on your investment.

Targeting the wrong audience

Over 6 million businesses are using Facebook ads to reach their target audiences. The very best thing about Facebook ads is that they allow you to target a very particular audience. Facebook’s targeting features allow you to work to a budget, yet still connect with the specific audience you are trying to reach.

So it goes without saying that one of the worst things you can do with Facebook ads is to target the wrong audience.

Facebook’s audience as a whole is huge and probably 99% of those people won’t be interested in your products or services. So you shouldn’t target everybody with your ads. More people seeing your ads doesn’t actually mean more people buying your products or services. Some of those people may engage with your brand or click on your links, but if they aren’t interested in what you have to offer and don’t go ahead and buy, you are wasting your money.

The aim with Facebook ads is to get them seen by a significant number of people who would find the ads relevant and would benefit from your product or service.

With every advertising campaign on Facebook, you need to set up a custom audience. You start with the basics – location, age, gender and language – before moving onto your detailed targeting.

To target the right audience, you need to understand them.

One of the best ways to do that is to use Audience Insights, which will you will find above Page Insights. Using this, you can find the common interests and demographics of your audience, including how active they are on Facebook and the pages they like.

You can also do a basic survey of your existing customers, to find out things like their job, age, gender and location. If your survey shows that a lot of women in their 50s who work part-time are buying your products, it would make sense to target this particular audience.

Choosing a too big or too small audience

67% of social advertisers consider Facebook to be the most effective social media platform they use. This is because once you’ve given Facebook all of the information it needs to reach the type of audience you want to target, it will show you the potential number of people you could reach. It is important to choose this number carefully to make the best use of your money.

There is a fine line between reaching an audience which is too big and reaching one which is too small. The aim is to reach that perfect number somewhere in the middle. By looking at the ‘potential reach’ provided by Facebook when creating your advert, you will get an indication if you’re heading in the right direction.

If the potential reach of your ad is 250,000, ask yourself whether your business will benefit from being seen by that many people. Clearly for a large company, that number (or higher) would be right, but for a small local business that is far more people than would realistically be interested in what you have to offer.

If the audience you are trying to reach is smaller than that, you can adjust your targeting to be more specific and reach a narrower and more realistic number of people.

But beware of reducing the audience by too much, because Facebook doesn’t show ads to a very small audience.

To get a good return on your advertising spend, you need to balance:

The size of your audience
The quality of your audience
The amount you are paying to reach that audience

So how can you be sure whether your audience is too big, too small or just the right size?

Collect data from a bigger audience – targeting a broad audience initially isn’t a bad thing. You might waste a little bit of your budget by reaching the wrong people, but you will pick up valuable data which will help you learn about the right people to target. This gives you the room to learn and make adjustments to your audience one step at a time. If you start with a small audience, you won’t be able to pick up enough data to help you make decisions on future campaigns.

Focus on your conversions – an advert is pointless if it doesn’t lead to conversions (unless you are advertising purely for brand awareness). The aim should always be to get a good conversion rate (eg sales, signing up for a subscription or trial, donating to a charity etc) without burning up a huge budget. The more specific your reach, the more expensive each click will become, so you will pay more for ‘women in Gloucestershire who are 35-50 and like shoes’ rather than ‘women in the UK who like shoes’. So the key thing is to know when to stop narrowing your targeting down. When you reach your optimal audience size, you shouldn’t need to apply any more levels of targeting.

Be brave and try a smaller audience – When you target your Facebook ads effectively, you will get a better response in terms of clicks and sales. Targeting a narrower audience means your ad will be highly relevant to the people who see it, giving you the potential to earn a better return on your investment. If you know your niche well, you can be brave and target a much smaller audience which is more likely to buy from you. There will be some trial and error, but you will learn more about your audience as you move forward, meaning you can improve your ads every time.

Failing to use video

If you’re not using video for your Facebook ads, you are missing a trick.

A recent survey showed that around 7 out of 10 people thought Facebook ads were relevant, and that most consumers like video better than images in ads.

Interestingly, most consumers prefer to watch their videos without the sound on, so it is important to adapt to that to make sure you can still get your message across. If your video is meaningless without sound, you have wasted time and money on creating an ineffective ad.

That’s why it is important to create video ads with subtitles which are easy to read. Facebook has made this possible as part of its own ad creator.

Not using a quality image

Facebook has 2.6 billion active users worldwide. Between them, they are sharing hundreds of millions of pieces of content every day. So how do you make your ad stand out when your target audience are scrolling through Facebook?

Images are really key to the performance of a Facebook ad. In fact, they can make up to 90% difference. So if you don’t focus on using an image which is good quality, eye catching and relevant, you will be losing money and not getting the return on investment you were aiming for.

It goes without saying that a Facebook ad is a visual thing. People see an image before they read your copy. The image you use needs to be interesting enough for a person to stop scrolling and take a look at it. If the image you use isn’t going to appeal to your target audience, you won’t attract their attention and they won’t click on your ad.

When advertising on Facebook, you have a choice of a single image ad or multiple image ads in the form of slideshow, carousel or collection ads. These multiple image choices can make your ads even more engaging, leading to an increase in clicks and conversions, but only if you get the images right!

So how do you choose the right image for your ads?

The key thing is to always focus on the purpose of your ad, which could be for conversions, reach, engagement or even to drive footfall to a physical store. Your ad is essentially an offer to your audience, which will drive them to take the action you want them to take. Your images, whether photos, graphics or a mixture of the two, need to fit with that objective.

Every single image you use on your Facebook ads should be relevant to your offer to your potential customers. Using a random image which isn’t relevant to your product, service or brand won’t help you achieve your objectives and is a waste of your advertising budget.

But while your image needs to grab attention and encourage your audience to take the next step, it shouldn’t be so distracting that it will stop people from reading your copy and clicking on your link.

If you haven’t got quite the right images, you can use a tool like Canva to enhance and customise them to make them work for your campaign.

Changing your ad too soon

Your Facebook ads aren’t going to produce miracles overnight, so it is important not to give up on them too soon. You are investing money in your ads and it is understandable that you want to see results quickly. It is not unusual to feel like you are wasting money at the start.

But it is important to be patient and not start changing your ads too soon. In fact, it is important to allow your ads to run in their original form for a little while, so that you can pick up valuable data. This data will give your more insight into what works and what doesn’t and can help you improve your ads for the future.

Ideally you should wait until your ads have reached 1,000-2,000 people before making any changes. This should give you enough data to learn from and make decisions on where to go next – whether that is to tweak your ads to make them even better or look at where they went wrong so you can make more radical changes.

A good starting point is to consider how much you are willing to spend on advertising to pick up a single sale. It might be that you are happy to break even on your first sale (essentially all of your profit spent on advertising), but that won’t be a trend you will want to continue in the long-term as your advertising gains momentum.

So after that initial expensive sale, you should learn from your ads and make gradual changes to optimise them, which will bring better results for your business.

Failing to use the Facebook pixel

Facebook ads use a piece of code called the pixel, which helps an advertiser learn more about their audience and the actions they take. Using the Facebook pixel helps you to improve the targeting of your ads.

The Facebook pixel is a very effective way to collect data from your own website. From this, you can tell more about your audience and the way they engage with your brand on Facebook. This means you can create better ads which will engage your audience and increase your conversions.

If the objective for your ads is lead generation, Facebook doesn’t understand what that means to your business before you have actually generated some leads. Once you begin picking up leads, it will start to show you the relevant data.

It is very easy to set up the pixel when setting up your ads, by simply following the prompts.

The key reasons for using it are:

It helps you optimise your ads effectively, so that you can increase your conversions
It helps you build custom audiences by remarketing to website visitors through your Facebook ads
It tracks conversions on your site, so you know how much of your advertising traffic is converting to leads or sales

If you don’t use the pixel, you are missing out. People who have visited your website already are likely to be more interested in what you have to offer than a completely cold audience. The pixel offers you a way to reach them again easily through Facebook. By targeting this audience, you increase your chances of making a sale – and at a lower cost than targeting a completely new audience.

Facebook ads are a really essential advertising tool which work well for most businesses. But with so many different options to get them right, there are also many chances to get them wrong. Take your time to focus on your objectives and your audience, and keep A/B testing to get the best results for your business.

Facebook ads vs boosted posts: Which is best?

Mon, 21 Dec 2020 13:48:45 GMT

When it comes to reaching new audiences through advertising, Facebook offers two options – Facebook ads and boosted posts.

Many businesses who say they use advertising on Facebook actually only use the boosted post option and are missing out on the full capacity of Facebook ads. They may be unaware of the capabilities and range of choices available through Facebook ads and simply opt for boosting posts because it is quicker and more convenient.

So what is the difference between Facebook ads and boosted posts, and what are the advantages and disadvantages of them?

What is a boosted post?

A boosted post on Facebook is a very simple ad. It is already an organic post, and you can pay some money to ‘boost’ it. This is very easy to do, as the boost button is on the bottom of the post on your Facebook business page. Using the boost option means your post will appear higher on the News Feed of your existing audience. It will also be shown to some people who don’t follow your business on Facebook, but have similar likes and demographics to your audience.

The idea of a boosted post is to increase the visibility of an organic post so that users are more likely to engage with it, through liking, sharing and commenting. When you boost your post, you can also select a ‘website visit’ objective to show it to an audience which is more likely to visit your site. To increase the possibility of them visiting your website, you have the option to select the sort of audience you want to see your boosted post, based on their interests, location and association to your page (eg existing followers or friends of followers).

With boosted posts, you also decide on how you want to scale your budget and where you want the post placed on Facebook, Instagram or Messenger.

What is the difference between a boosted post and an ad?

There are many differences between boosted posts and Facebook ads and we will talk in much more depth about Facebook ads later on. But a really fundamental difference is that boosted posts are one-offs – a single thing that you want to promote now – whereas Facebook ads are campaigns. Facebook ads are designed to be ongoing and are much more effective when used in that way, rather than as a single, short-term ad to promote one thing.

With Facebook ads, you get better targeting, better reporting and better analytics. They are much easier to keep track of through Facebook Ads Manager and are working towards a much bigger aim as part of an overall strategy.

Facebook ads should be used to drive traffic to your website and increase sales. Boosted posts can be more effective in increasing awareness for something like a single event. Boosted posts can drive engagement, but that isn’t necessarily going to increase sales. Facebook ads drive more leads and give a much better return on investment, as you are targeting a carefully selected audience.

Why you should choose Facebook ads over boosted posts

In most cases, Facebook ads will be more effective for your business than boosted posts. Here are the main reasons why…

Ads have more objectives than boosted posts

An objective in Facebook ads is the reason why you are running the advertising campaign – it specifies what action you would like your audience to take. By choosing certain objectives over others, you are spending your advertising cash wisely to reach an audience which is more likely to be interested in your products or services.

Facebook ads offer 11 objectives to choose from. They are:

Brand awareness – introduce your brand to a new audience
Reach – get your ad seen by as many people as possible
Engagement – reach a wide audience to increase your engagements or likes on Facebook
Traffic – drive visitors to a particular web page
Video views – get more people watching your videos
App installs – encourage people to install your app
Lead generation – encourage new people into your sales funnel
Conversions – encourage specific actions on your website, including sales or signing up for subscriptions
Messages – get people to contact your business through Facebook Messenger
Catalogue sales – link your ads to the product pages for the items people are most likely to buy
Store traffic – increase footfall to your bricks and mortar shop

By contrast, boosted posts have just two objectives – website visits and engagement.

More placement options

Facebook ads gives you far more options of exactly where to place your ads than you get with boosted posts. You have the choice of Facebook, Instagram, Audience Network (external websites) and Messenger. Within each of those placements there is a further range of choices. For example, for Facebook itself you can choose from: News Feeds; Stories; Instant Articles; In-stream videos; Suggested videos; Right column; and Marketplace.

This means you can select the perfect placement for the audience you are trying to target – for instance, you are more likely to find the younger generation on Instagram Stories and the older generation on Facebook News Feeds.

Make sure you take the time to select the placements yourself, rather than relying on Facebook’s own Automatic Placement option. Using Automatic Placement could lead to a higher proportion of ads on external sites through Audience Network placements. While these may generate clicks, they are less likely to lead to conversions and sales. From Facebook’s point of view, an ad which achieves lots of clicks is ‘successful’, but for a business a successful ad is one which leads to more conversions and sales. Advertising through Facebook itself (or Instagram) may generate less clicks, but more sales, so make sure you choose your placements wisely!

You can target custom audiences with Facebook ads

With Facebook ads, you have more options for customisation, to create an audience which is likely to be interested in your products and services.

The three options for creating your audience are: lookalike audience; custom audience; and saved audience.

Lookalike audience – this allows you to reach a new audience which shares similarities with the audience which is already interested in your business. You can create your lookalike audience based on people who like your page, custom audiences you have already created or conversion pixels (which track audience behaviours on your site, such as the pages they looked at, items they put in their baskets etc).

Custom audience – you can create an audience of people who have already shown an interest in your company through website traffic, engagement on Facebook or Instagram, uploading a customer file, app activity and even offline activity. This allows your business to retarget an audience which is more likely to go ahead with a purchase.

Saved audience - if you have already run a number of campaigns on Facebook ads and targeted similar groups of people, you can save these frequently-used targeting options to make creating future campaigns quicker and easier.

Testing to maximise your spend

It is unlikely you will get your advertising spot-on the first time around. That’s why it is so important to keep testing your ads. Facebook ads give you the ability to A/B test (run slightly different versions of the same advert) your ads. This means you can see which works best and invest your budget in the most effective version.

You also have a number of options available for your testing:

Placements
Creative
Delivery optimisation strategies
Audiences

With so many options to choose from, the chances of you continuously losing money through your adverts is greatly reduced.

Boosted posts don’t give you all of these options, as the post is already on your timeline organically. If you boosted your post, but either your audience, creative, delivery strategies or placements were wrong, you will have wasted money on the post and gained nothing from it.

Facebook ads have more creative options

For Facebook ads to grab attention and encourage potential customers to take action, they need to stand out. Which is why Facebook ads have a whole range of creative options to meet the needs of a large variety of audiences. By contrast, the boosted post options are limited to single image or video posts.

Facebook ads offers this range of formats:

Single image ads - Simple image ads are a great way to get started with Facebook advertising. You can create one very quickly, simply by boosting an existing organic post from your company’s Facebook Page. (And if your company doesn’t have a Facebook Page, you need to set one up!)

While image ads might be simple, they don’t have to be boring if you use the right images. Look for a strong photo or graphic which really conveys your brand or your product – make it fun, colourful and hard to ignore!

Carousel ads - Carousel ads use as many as 10 images or videos to highlight your service or product. You can use them to look in-depth at the benefits of a single product, to promote a number of different products or even to piece the pictures together into a large panoramic image.

Video ads - Video ads can appear in your audience’s News Feed or Stories or as an advert during longer Facebook videos. Be imaginative with your videos to make sure you are using them in the most effective way. Can you show your product in action so your audience really gets a feel for it?

If you don’t have the time or the budget to film a full video, you can use simple animations or GIF-like graphics for your video ads.

If a prospective customer sees your video in their feed, it will also tell them how many of their friends already like your business. If several of their friends like what you do, they are more likely to be interested in your company and what you have to offer.

Collection ads - Collection ads are for mobile devices only. They allow you to showcase five different products and, importantly, allow customers to click to buy.

They are formatted in a way which has a single ‘hero’ image or video and four products below that one.

Slideshow ads - Slideshow ads are an easy way to create short videos from your existing or new content – including a collection of still photos, text or video clips. If you don’t have your own suitable images, you can use stock photos from Ads Manager.

The advantage of slideshow ads is that they use five times less bandwidth than video, but still have the eye-catching motion. They are a great way to grab people’s attention when they are on the go or have slow internet connections.

You should choose the ad format which closely aligns with your advertising objectives:

Single image – all objectives apart from video views
Carousel – all objectives except video views and engagement
Video – all objectives apart from catalogue sales
Collection – conversions, traffic, store traffic and catalogue sales
Slideshow – all objectives

Controlling your budget and scheduling

With Facebook ads, you can choose a lifetime or daily budget and choose when you want to schedule your ads, to ensure they reach as much of your target audience as possible. This means you can maximise your spend to give you the best return on investment.

If you were running an advertising campaign for an early evening drinks offer for a bar, you might choose to schedule the ads between 2pm and 5pm, so that people are made aware of the offer and can choose to use it that same evening.

Boosted posts only allow you to set a lifetime budget and a duration of days you would like the post to appear. You have no control over the specific time of day or days of the week when your posts are shown.

A daily budget on Facebook ads means you can stop running the ads when they are no longer performing as you would like them to. Facebook will also optimise your daily spend depending on how well your advert is performing. If you have a daily budget of £25, some days you may spend £30 and other days only £15, but it will average out at no more than £25 per day.

You can add a CTA to your Facebook ads

Facebook gives you the opportunity to add a call to action (CTA) to your ads. This makes it easier for your potential customers to take the next step you want them to take – whether that is to make a purchase, sign up for a subscription, donate to charity, ask for more information or something else.

Without a CTA, a potential customer might be confused by what their next action should be or how they should take it, which in turns means you risk losing a conversion.

Facebook offers 16 different CTAs to choose from, so there is something to meet every objective. Combining your objective with a CTA will increase the chances of a potential customer converting and give you a better return on your advertising spend.

Is there ever a right time for boosted posts?

Without a doubt, Facebook ads are more effective than boosted posts, especially if your aim is to drive potential customers to your website. But for a very small business, or one which is just starting out, boosted posts are good for brand awareness. For businesses like these, we understand that investing the time to get your Facebook ads off the ground may seem like a big commitment.

If that is the case, there is still a place for boosted posts. They can be effective for a very local business which has special offers running or new products to promote. If you have a bricks and mortar store, a boosted post can drive footfall to your store. But the vast majority of people who see your boosted posts will be people who already like your page. So you are increasing the reach to your organic fans, rather than attracting new ones.

In addition, if you are on a tight budget and just starting out, boosted posts are a good way to test the waters before starting work on a full advertising campaign.

Boosted posts can increase likes, shares and comments on a particular post, but that is unlikely to lead to any noticeable increase in sales. With the huge capabilities available through Facebook ads – from scheduling and budgeting options, through to clear objectives, a range of placement options and custom options – Facebooks ads are so much more effective in increasing leads, conversions and sales.

How to advertise on Facebook in 2021

Fri, 11 Dec 2020 14:34:07 GMT

Facebook is the world’s largest social network, so advertising on Facebook is a really essential way to connect with your audience.

It has 2.6 billion active users worldwide and 44.84 million in the UK. It is used daily by 44% of the UK population, with 11.2 million users in the 25 to 34 age bracket alone. ( Statista ) So if you want to connect with your audience, you need to embrace Facebook.

While it is possible to connect organically through Facebook, the ever-changing algorithm can make that a challenge. But the good news is that Facebook’s micro-targeting means you can reach your exact target audience through advertising.

Facebook ads allow you to get your message across to the people who are most likely to buy your products and services – and not waste time and money on advertising to people who wouldn’t be interested.

Used in the right way, Facebook ads are very competitively priced. They are good for your budget and return on investment, as well as your conversion rate.

There is more than one way to advertise on Facebook. In fact, there are a huge number of ways to advertise. To make your budget and your ads work for you, it is important to understand all of the options, so that you get the best results.

Here we will talk about everything you need to know about advertising on Facebook – from planning your very first adverts to developing proven advertising strategies.

Types of Facebook ads

The options for Facebook ads include video and even interactive ads, so you can select the type of ad which works best for your company, your products or services and, most importantly, the audience you are trying to reach.

Image ads

Simple image ads are a great way to get started with Facebook advertising. You can create one very quickly, simply by boosting an existing organic post from your company’s Facebook Page. (And if your company doesn’t have a Facebook Page, you need to set one up!)

Carousel ads

Carousel ads use as many as 10 images or videos to highlight your service or product. You can use them to look in-depth at the benefits of a single product, to promote a number of different products or even to piece the pictures together into a large panoramic image.

Video ads

Video ads can appear in your audience’s News Feed or Stories or as an advert during longer Facebook videos. Be imaginative with your videos to make sure you are using them in the most effective way. Can you show your product in action so your audience really gets a feel for it?

If you don’t have the time or the budget to film a full video, you can use simple animations or GIF-like graphics for your video ads.

Video poll ads

Video poll ads are an extension of video ads for mobile only. They include a simple interactive element – something like "Which do you prefer?" which helps increase engagement. Facebook’s own data suggests video polls are more effective at increasing brand awareness than regular video ads.

Collection ads

Collection ads are for mobile devices only. They allow you to showcase five different products and, importantly, allow customers to click to buy.

Working with Instant Experience ads, collection ads allow people to buy your products without having to leave Facebook and visit your website. This makes shopping very easy for people who are out and about and might not have a very good internet connection.

Instant Experience ads

Instant Experience ads are full-screen ads which have the advantage of very fast loading speeds – loading 15 times faster than a mobile website outside Facebook.

You can also link to additional Instant Experiences through Ads Manager, to allow your audience to discover more instant mobile content from your company.

Slideshow ads

Slideshow ads are an easy way to create short videos from your existing or new content – including a collection of still photos, text or video clips. If you don’t have your own suitable images, you can use stock photos from Ads Manager.

Dynamic ads

Dynamic ads can be particularly effective, as they allow you to promote products to the consumers who are most likely to be interested in them.

If someone has looked at a particular product on your website, or even put it in their online shopping basket and abandoned it, dynamic ads for that product will appear on their feed when they browse Facebook. The ad will remind a potential customer to go ahead and make the purchase.

Dynamic ads can be used in a number of formats, including image, collection and carousel ads.

Lead ads

Lead ads are another mobile-only form of advertising, which are designed specifically to help prospective customers give you their contact details without a lot of typing. They are a great way to feed into your sales funnel by capturing essential information about your audience.

They are particularly effective if you want to pick up newsletter subscribers, encourage people to request a demo or sign up for a trial of your product.

Lead ads can use carousel, image, video or slideshow advertising formats.

Stories ads

Stories ads are full-screen vertical video ads, created for the high proportion of the population who won’t turn their phones round to watch widescreen videos. (Scientific American)

More than half of the people surveyed by Ipsos on behalf of Facebook said they were making more online purchases due to Stories ads.

Stories augmented reality ads

Stories augmented reality ads really do bring your brand and your products to life. Using filters and animation, they provide a new way for your audience to interact with your business.

Messenger ads

There are 1.3 billion monthly users of Facebook Messenger worldwide – and Messenger ads gives you access to them. When setting up your ads, select Messenger as your chosen placement.

You can also send prospective customers to Messenger to start a conversation with you by running click-to-Messenger ads in the Facebook feed. This opens a Messenger conversation between your page and the prospective customer, so that they can have a one-to-one conversation with your sales team.

Playable ads

Playable ads are another new and interactive form of advertising from Facebook. These would definitely be aimed at fun products and the younger end of the market. They allow you to create a game to encourage your audience to interact with your brand and your content.

How to advertise on Facebook

The first step to advertising on Facebook is to have a Facebook business page. If you don’t yet have one, you should! Once you’ve got your Facebook business page, you need to go to Facebook Ads Manager to set up your first Facebook advertising campaign. (Alternatively, you can use Business Manager on Facebook to set up your ads if you prefer.)

Choose your objective

In Ads Manager, select Campaigns and click Create to get started.

You have a choice of 11 goals to align with your objectives for your advertising campaign:

Brand awareness – introduce your brand to a new audience
Reach – get your ad seen by as many people as possible
Engagement – reach a wide audience to increase your engagements or likes on Facebook
Traffic – drive visitors to a particular web page
Video views – get more people watching your videos
App installs – encourage people to install your app
Lead generation – encourage new people into your sales funnel
Conversions – encourage specific actions on your website, including sales or signing up for subscriptions
Messages – get people to contact your business through Facebook Messenger
Catalogue sales – link your ads to the product pages for the items people are most likely to buy
Store traffic – increase footfall to your bricks and mortar shop

Choose one of these 11 objectives based on your goals for each advertising campaign.

For conversion or sales-based objectives, you will be charged per action, whereas for exposure objectives (eg views and traffic) you will pay for impressions (each time the ad is loaded).

Give it a name

Over time, you will probably have a large number of Facebook ads running, so give each campaign a name so you can keep track of it.

At this point, you can choose whether or not to run an A/B test, which will help you find out if one version of an ad is more effective than another. We would always recommend running an A/B test! You have nothing to lose in selecting this option.

You can also select at this point whether to use budget optimisation, which allows Facebook to decide how to divide the budget between Facebook ad sets (a group of ads which share the settings for how, when and where to run).

Set up your ad account

You may already have got an ad account set up, but if not, you need to create one. Click the Set Up Ad Account button and enter the key details to create your account – including your preferred currency, time zone and country.

Make sure you do it carefully, because if you want to change this information later, you will need to set up a whole new account.

Choose your audience

For your Facebook ads to be effective, this stage is really key.

Scroll down to start building your ideal target audience. Start by choosing your target location, gender, age and language. As you make each selection, keep checking the audience size indicator, which will give you an idea of the potential reach of the ads.

Once you’ve added the basics of your audience, you move onto the important detailed targeting. Effective targeting is the best way to make the most of your budget. You have two fields to help you make your audience as individual as you like:

Detailed targeting – use this to specifically include or leave out people based on interests, behaviours and demographics. You can be really particular here – for example you could include people who are interested in running long distances, but exclude people who are only interested in sprinting.
Connections – you may want to reach a whole new audience or you may want to reconnect with people who have already engaged with your brand on Facebook. If you want to reach a new audience, select Exclude people who like your Page but if you want to target existing fans, choose People who like your Page. You can also choose to target friends of people who have already engaged with your brand.

Choose your placement

You have a range of options of where to run your ads. If you are new to Facebook ads, you may simply want to choose Automatic Placements , which means Facebook will place your ads across Instagram, Facebook, Messenger and its Audience Network – external websites, including gaming apps, which work in partnership with Facebook.

Once you have more understanding of the effectiveness of different channels, you may wish to choose specific locations.

You can choose from:

Platform – Facebook, Instagram, Messenger or Audience Network
Device type – desktop, mobile or both
Placements – Feeds, Stories, messages, apps and (external) websites

Set your schedule and budget

Decide how much you want to spend on your ads and set a daily or lifetime budget. Then either set them to start straightaway or choose a start date, as well as an end date.

To avoid overspending, you also have the option to set cost and bid controls, which will limit the spend per action eg you could set a maximum of 50p for each page like and a maximum of £25 per day on the campaign.

Advanced budget options mean you can go into fine detail on exactly how you want to spend your money effectively.

If you have a lifetime budget, you can choose to only show your advert when people are most likely to be on Facebook to increase the effectiveness of your ads.

Create your ad

To create your ad, first choose your format eg single image or video, carousel or collection. Facebook will give you a range of format options based on the campaign objective you chose at the start. Then add the text and media (eg images or video) for your ad. Each type of ad has different specifications for the amount of text you can use. It is important to stick to this or some of your text will get cut off.

Before going ahead, use the preview to check the advert looks good for all potential placements – desktop, mobile, News Feed etc. Once you are happy, click Confirm and wait to get an email from Facebook to let you know that your ad has got the go-ahead.

Which ads to use?

When setting up your ads, it is important to use the right ads for your campaign objectives.

So which ads are the right ads?

Image – all objectives apart from video views
Carousel – all objectives except video views and engagement
Video – all objectives apart from catalogue sales
Collection – conversions, traffic, store traffic and catalogue sales
Instant Experience – all objectives apart from messages, lead generation and catalogue sales
Slideshow - all
Facebook Stories – engagement, store traffic, catalogue sales and messages
Messenger – messages, traffic, app installs, catalogue sales and conversions

Make the most of your Facebook ads

So you’ve got your Facebook advertising campaign up and running. How can you be sure you are getting the very best from it? The following tips should help…

Tweak your audience targeting

You want your adverts to reach the right people, so it is best to start with a narrow audience. Then gradually broaden it by one interest category at a time.

So you could start off with ‘garden furniture Cotswolds’ and then extend it after a few weeks. You could start by adding ‘garden accessories Cotswolds’, then ‘garden furniture Cheltenham’ and so on.

At each stage, you will see how expanding the audience affects your results. Does it bring in more sales or do you end up paying more as your ads are being seen by large numbers of people who aren’t interested in your products?

Use good quality images and videos

Blurry photos or jumpy videos are never going to appeal to your audience, so make sure you always use good quality images and videos in your ads . While it is important for prospective customers to read the words in your ads, it is the images which will attract them in the first place.

If you don’t have enough good quality images of your own, make use of free stock photo websites.

Keep testing

You can never be completely sure what will appeal to your target audience until you have tested it. So every time you try something new, make sure you test it against your previous ads.

Remember that tastes and trends change, so something that appealed to your audience two years ago might not be as attractive to them now. To keep your own knowledge up-to-date, you need to keep testing.

Make the most of the Facebook pixel

The Facebook pixel is a piece of code on your website which means you can track conversions from your Facebook ads. It helps you remarket to people who have already shown an interest in a product or service on your site and create lookalike audiences (learning from your existing customers to help you target similar people who are likely to become good customers too).

Keep track of performance

You should monitor the performance of your ads through the Facebook Ads Manager dashboard. If your campaign isn’t working well, move your money to a different campaign which is performing better.

At the start, it might make sense to run a few adverts with small budgets and audiences. Once it is clear which of them works best, you can use this as your main campaign – and base future ads on it.

There are tools to make this process simpler – AdEspresso is great for SMEs, while Hootsuite Ads is good for larger businesses, allowing you to create and test hundreds of ads in a few minutes.

Ideas to get you started

You’ve now got all the information you need to start advertising on Facebook, but if you’re still not sure what to promote, here are a few ideas to get you started…

Make direct sales

Fundamentally, most advertising is aimed at driving sales. So one strategy is actually to aim for direct sales from your Facebook ads. This works especially well for a brand which is already well known and has recognised or popular products, especially products which are priced fairly low.

The direct sales approach is particularly good for people who have already visited your website and shown an interest in your products and may have even put products in their basket and not completed the purchase. Remarketing with special offers, product recommendations and reminders to complete a purchase is a good strategy to use.

Convert high performing content to video

Most companies will have a few pieces of evergreen content (eg blogposts) which drive a lot of traffic every month. Turning those into a short video is a great way to create content for your Facebook ads. If it worked well organically in the written form, it should also perform well as a video ad.

To create your video, you need to convey your key message through images and short text. There are plenty of free and low cost social video apps and tools to help you, such as Animoto, Biteable and iMovie. You could also create a slideshow ad through Facebook Ads Manager.

Go offline

Many businesses using Facebook ads have bricks and mortar businesses too. You don’t have to limit your advertising to online sales. Using the store traffic objective, you can promote offline purchases too, whether you have a shop, a restaurant, a beauty salon or something else.

For a high-end product, the lead generation objective can be used to get people into your store to actually see your product and maybe give it a try. This would work well for furniture or even cars.

It can also be used to attract people to an offline event, which could be anything from a B2B conference to a free event such as a Christmas market or a paid event like a concert. The engagement objective will create interest and drive event responses on Facebook, while the conversions and traffic objectives will help sell more tickets.

Facebook has a tool for tracking these offline conversions, so you can see if your adverts are effective in increasing your offline sales. This information can also help you build custom audiences of people who have shown an interest in your brand offline, so that you can target them for future campaigns.

With nearly 45 million users in the UK alone, Facebook is the place to be for businesses in a wide range of sectors looking to expand their reach. If you haven’t yet given Facebook ads a go, your business could be missing out. With competitively priced advertising campaigns and very focused targeting, they will allow you to make contact with exactly the right audience.

We’ve given you all the information you need to get started, so what are you waiting for?

B2B Christmas Marketing for 2020

Wed, 09 Dec 2020 12:58:28 GMT

2020 has certainly been a year to remember for businesses all over the world but there is still time for you to make the most of the remaining working days of the year with our Christmas marketing tips.

1. Marketing Campaigns are key

The best Christmas marketing campaigns start at the end of October however if you’ve only just started to think about it now, there’s still time make an impact! Many consumers are waiting for last minute deals and don’t shop until the final few weeks before Christmas – make the most of this audience by creating a seasonal offer or sending holiday advertisements to motivate them to buy.

2. Offer a great customer experience

A lot of companies make the mistake of focusing on quantity over quality, especially at busy times of the year. This can cause a reduction in good customer service and an increase in complaints and bad reviews. To ensure everyone has the most wonderful time of the year, make sure that you and your team are on the ball – answering emails, staying on top of social media and assisting with order queries.

3. Don’t forget to give thanks.

The end of the year is a great time to reflect on how your customers have made your business sparkle – especially after a challenging year! By thanking your previous customers you are showing gratitude and keeping your brand personable which in return creates greater customer loyalty. Whether you send out a physical card or a personalised email campaign, you can help spread joy and encourage previous customers to return to you for their holiday shopping needs.

4. Offer festive extras

Everybody loves a free gift, especially when it comes to Christmas. By giving your customers a special offer, a saving or a free gift with a purchase above a certain price point they are more likely to buy and may even spend more! This will feel like a win for both you and your customers as they get a little something extra and you may see your sales amplify!

5. Customer Retargeting

A lot of people will leave a website without making a purchase – this isn’t always down to what your company is offering and can just be that they got distracted and clicked away. If you are able to collect emails of the people visiting your site, or those who haven't completed the check-out process then why not send them a quick reminder. This can encourage them to come back and buy. Even better – why not remind them with a special offer like 10% off their purchase?

6. Host Contests or Giveaways

Contests and giveaways on social media are one of the best ways to increase your following. By hosting a competition on Instagram or Facebook you can get more people talking about your business and entice them to purchase from you. Even better, pair up with a brands that have shared ethics or a similar target audience to increase your reach even further.

7. Produce festive ads

Whether you create a series of social media posts, blogs or emails you can really establish your brand over the festive period. You’ll want to decide what works best for you depending on your business but if you are selling products it may be worth investing in PPC (pay-per-click) advertising to get in front of your audience. Think about your presentation and wording; people are much more likely to click on something advertising “the perfect gift for your loved ones” than “bath bombs for sale”.

8. Launch a video marketing campaign

Did you know that one minute of video is the equivalent to eight million words ?! Video popularity has shot up over the last year due to platforms like Tiktok and Instagram promoting their new ‘reels’ feature. Adding video to your emails, website or social media can help you connect with your audience easily and invites them to get to know you and your products even better.

If you want to make the most of your video marketing why not wish your customers and suppliers a Merry Christmas using one of our personalised festive videos?

The team have been busy putting together 6 videos for you to choose from, we can add your logo and a festive Christmas hat on top and then give you versions to share on your website, via email and on social media.

View and order the videos here > >

Once you’ve placed your order within 24 hours we can:

Remove the CW branding
Add in your logo with a Christmas hat, the hat is optional :)
Change the text
Swap out the music to music from another of the videos
Create a landing page and embed code
Provide a HD1080 video and lower resolution versions for social media

View and order the videos here > >

Remarketing for ecommerce businesses

Mon, 07 Dec 2020 14:16:21 GMT

It doesn’t matter how brilliant your products are, or how fantastic your website looks, the reality is that 98% of visitors aren’t going to buy from you on their first visit .

But that’s not to say that they won’t buy on their second or third visit.

And to make sure there is a second and third visit, ecommerce businesses need to make the most of remarketing.

Remarketing means showing targeted adverts to people who have previously visited your website . They will see these ads when they are browsing the web, scrolling through Facebook or watching a YouTube video. They are a good reminder to return to your site and look again at the product they were considering – and maybe this time they will buy.

There are two main channels for remarketing – Facebook Ads and Google Ads . Google Ads allows businesses to remarket via its Display Network of advertising on around 2 million websites and hundreds of thousands of apps. With Facebook, your ads will appear on people’s news feeds. You can also run remarketing ads via Instagram, which is owned by Facebook.

Remarketing ads are able to follow visitors around the web because a business owner has added a piece of code onto their website. This is known as the Google Remarketing Tag on Google and the Facebook Pixel on Facebook. It tracks website visitors and allows an ecommerce company to remarket to them.

The main benefits of remarketing are higher click through rates and higher conversion rates. Remarketing ads have significantly higher click through rates than general ads, as a consumer has already shown an interest in a particular company or product, while website visitors who arrive on a site through remarketing ads are 70% more likely to convert .

Google Ads remarketing

Google offers a range of choices for remarketing. The default options are standard or dynamic remarketing, but it also offers a range of other choices, including for mobile apps, video, email list and search ads.

Standard remarketing shows ads to past visitors who are browsing apps or sites on Google Display Network. Dynamic remarketing goes a step further, by featuring the specific products or services a potential customer has already looked at.

Remarketing ads are usually display ads, but remarketing lists for search ads (RLSA) campaigns allow you to target previous visitors when they carry out a related search on Google.

Remarketing for mobile apps specifically targets consumers who have searched a store on mobile – either through an app or the mobile site. These ads will only be shown on mobiles, not on laptops or desktops.

Email list remarketing allows you to remarket to people who are already on your email subscriber list. By uploading your email list to Google Ads, you will be able to target them when they are using Google search, YouTube or Gmail.

If you have a YouTube channel or post videos online, you can use video remarketing to target people who have previously interacted with you through your videos. These visitors will see your ads when they are watching videos on either YouTube or sites on the Google Display Network.

How to use Google Ads for remarketing

To ensure your Google Ads remarketing is effective, you need to target the right audience. You can target website visitors based on what they do on your site – the pages they visit, the time spent on the site, whether they have added an item to their basket etc. You can also target people based on their geographical location (local, regional or national) and demographic information, such as age and gender.

By targeting your ads in this way, you can feel more confident that they are reaching the right people – people who are more likely to buy.

It also makes sense to remarket to existing and returning customers, not just people who have only visited your site once . Existing customers were happy to buy from you in the past, so it’s likely they would be happy to buy from you again. This makes a lot of financial sense, because the advertising required to gain a new customer costs five times as much as keeping an existing customer.

Once you know who you want to remarket to, you need to set up your Google Ads account via the Google Ads page, if you haven’t already done so. Then you will need to add the remarketing tags to your website. The global site tag will capture information about the pages viewed by visitors, while the event snippet collects data about the actions they take on your site – such as looking at particular products or adding something to their basket.

Then you need to return to the list of your ideal visitors to set up your remarketing list, either directly in Google Ads or through Google Analytics. Google Analytics allows you to target far more specific demographics than using Google Ads itself.

As with any other Google Ads campaign, for a remarketing campaign you will need to select a budget and bidding strategies before your advertising goes live. Bidding strategies include cost per click and cost per action bids. You can either manage your bids manually or automate them.

Strategies that work

It goes without saying that for ads to be effective, they need to appeal to your target audience. So make sure you think about the language and images you use in your remarketing.

To make your ads more attractive and increase the chances of a person making a purchase, you may want to use a special offer on your ads, such as free delivery, a free gift or a percentage off the price.

Where your ads show up also has a huge impact on whether or not they work . If a consumer is looking for a new dog bed, seeing an ad for the bed when they are searching for a local vet would make sense. It wouldn’t make sense to see an advert for a dog bed when they are busy working and looking at professional services websites. In fact, seeing an advert for a dog bed when they are looking up accountants would actually have the complete opposite effect to the one you are looking for and make them far less likely to make a purchase.

You can see exactly where your ads are placed, how well they are converting and the cost per conversion through your Google Ads account. If you see that a particular placement eg for the vet’s surgery gives you a low cost per conversion, you could edit your bid to allocate more budget to it. You can also pause or remove any advertising placements which aren’t working well.

When setting up your remarketing lists, you can fine-tune them to show ads for a particular length of time (membership duration) from a day to 18 months. For a low value product that people buy regularly, you may want to set your membership duration for around a month. For a high cost item, like a car or holiday, you are likely to go for a much longer period of time. Don’t select the maximum duration for all products, because you will be wasting money on showing ads to people who have already decided not to buy. You also risk annoying them if they see your ads too often.

You can also set frequency capping, which is the number of times a potential customer sees your ad in a set period of time – whether that is a day, a week or a month. If a potential customer sees the same ad every day for a week they are likely to be irritated by it. But if an existing customer sees a variety of similar ads (perhaps with different special offers) every day for a week, they are more likely to go ahead and buy.

If you spend some time setting up your ads and targeting the right audience, remarketing can be a really effective way of bringing back existing customers or people who have previously shown an interest in what you have to offer . Targeted correctly, remarketing can be far more effective than advertising to people cold.

A/B testing to improve conversions

Mon, 30 Nov 2020 14:32:57 GMT

A/B testing, sometimes called split testing, is comparing two different versions of a web page, email or ad to see which performs better.

A/B tests are carried out by giving one version to one group of people and a different version to another group. You can then judge which one works best, whether you are looking to increase sales, clicks or subscriptions.

Knowing which version is most effective will help you plan for the future , when you design new web pages, marketing campaigns, emails or anything else.

Creating your website, landing page or PPC advertising is your first step. Once you have created them, you want to know what helps and what hinders sales.

Even the smallest changes can impact sales and A/B testing will show you which words, images, headlines and even colours have the most impact.

The best elements to test are:

Headlines and copywriting

Your headline is the first thing visitors see, so it needs to grab their attention. If you’re not sure what to write, digital marketing expert Neil Patel has a video with some great suggestions . The remainder of your copy is important too – think about the length of your paragraphs and the language you use. Are your potential customers interested in the hard sell or a softer approach, do they like formal language or a chatty style, do they prefer statistics or anecdotes?

Images and video

The images you use and where you place them can increase conversions, so test different variations. Do people prefer close-up products shots or photos of people using the products? Do they react better to larger or small images? Would people rather watch a video than read a page of copy?

CTAs

Your call to action (CTA) tells visitors what you want them to do, and even small changes can make a difference. Try using a button instead of a link or a different size, shape or colour of button. The important thing is to change only one element at a time.

Page length

Some people want to know everything there is to know about a product from the start, while others just want the basics. Not sure which category your target audience falls into? Test shorter landing pages and blogposts against significantly longer versions to see which ones convert better.

Email subject lines

Email can be a very effective form of marketing, but the challenge is always to get people to open them in the first place. If a reader isn’t interested in the subject heading, they will simply delete without opening. Vary the length of subject lines and try questions or action words to see which works best.

Product descriptions

Do your customers need to know everything from your product descriptions, or are they happy with basic information? Test detailed descriptions against shorter versions to see which works best. Once you know what length of description to use, try testing the layout too – do your visitors respond better to bullet points or a simple few lines of text?

Reviews and testimonials

At least 70% of people use online reviews before they buy, so it’s really important to share reviews and testimonials across you site. Test star ratings against words and static reviews against scrolling reviews. Do testimonials work better if they are bigger or a different font to the other text on a page?

Landing pages

Your landing pages are some of the most important pages on your site. If visitors don’t convert here, you risk losing the sale. Test the layout of your landing pages to find out where people are more likely to click, then put the most important elements of the page, like your CTAs, in that position.

Email marketing

It is easy to A/B test your marketing emails – simply send one version to half of your subscribers and the other version to the other half. Make sure each half is balanced and representative of your entire audience, so that the results are valid.

How to do A/B testing

A/B testing isn’t rocket science, but you need to start with a strategy. Target the areas which are working least well or which can give you the quick wins.

You could start with a question, like ‘Why aren’t subscribers opening my emails?’. By making changes to the subject line, images, copy length etc, you can collect the data which will give you the answer to the question.

Here’s an easy process to follow…

Choose what you want to test

It should be relevant to the improvements you want to make – so if you are looking to improve conversions, focus on your headlines or a CTA .

Set goals

What are you looking to improve? Whether it is sales or conversions or time spent on a page, focus on a single goal first to give you clear data.

Analyse your data

Use something like Google Analytics to look at your existing data. This is your starting point and your aim is to improve on your starting point.

Choose the page to test

Focus on an important page first , which could be your home page or a landing page with lots of traffic. Improving this page could have a significant impact on your bottom line.

Set the elements to A/B test

Start with the elements of your page which are most likely to help you reach your goal.

Create your challenger

Create a variant of the element you selected above, with just one change. You might change the wording of the headline or the colour of the CTA button, while everything else should stay exactly the same.

Choose your testing tools

If you are A/B testing your email, most service providers have built-in testing tools. If you are testing your landing pages, you could try Crazy Egg’s tool .

Design your test

Make sure you include detail like how long the test should run for, because you want enough data for it to be meaningful.

Wait for the data

Some tools, like Crazy Egg , will allow you to keep track of the progress of your test. When the test finishes, you can see how many people visited each variation, what devices they used and more.

Analyse the statistics

Did your original version win, or was it the challenger? Was there a significant difference between the two variations?

Start again

Once you have your data and your winner, you can start the process again with a different variant.

How long should a test run?

How long an A/B test should run depends on the sort of traffic you usually get and what it is you are testing. Testing an email is likely to be much quicker, as most people either open them straightaway or not at all.

It is important to run the test for long enough to iron out any differences over time. It may be that one variation appears to be much more popular at the start, but the difference between them decreases after a few hours or a few days.

If you are testing a landing page and have steady traffic, testing for a few weeks will probably give you the clear, statistically significant results you are looking for.

Many companies publish the findings of their A/B testing, so that others can benefit from their learning. You could look at A/B testing examples from other websites for inspiration and guidance. While your test is unlikely to be identical, it will give you a clearer idea of what to expect.

When looking at your results, you should consider how many visitors each variation received and by what percentage the winner beat the loser. A single figure percentage difference might indicate that your audience had no real preference for one variation or the other. But if one outperforms the other by 20 per cent or more, you have got valuable information about what your audience prefers.

A/B testing doesn’t give overnight results, but the results are accurate and reliable. They are one of the best indicators of what your audience likes in terms of the content and layout of your website, emails and ads. A/B testing can also help you create a smoother journey through your website, with less chance of your prospective customers becoming frustrated and going elsewhere, all of which will boost your sales and profits.

Keep going back and following the same procedure to help you learn more about what will persuade your audience to convert. This information can then feed into your website going forward to help the growth of your business and the bottom line.

Why you need to use LinkedIn for digital marketing

Wed, 25 Nov 2020 10:43:15 GMT

If you work mainly in the business-to-business (B2B) sector, rather than business-to-consumer, LinkedIn is a valuable addition to your digital marketing strategy , which you should definitely be using to promote your business.

LinkedIn launched in 2003, but even in 2020, there is still no better place to connect with and do business with other companies.

Linkedin has 722 million members (27.11.2020) and 50 million companies in 200 countries and regions worldwide ( Linkedin ):

191M+ in North America
163M+ in Europe
196M+ in Asia Pacific
107M+ in Latin America
63M+ in Middle East and Africa

Unlike Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, LinkedIn is a professional platform designed to help you establish and build business relationships. It offers a place to promote yourself and your company, find relevant business groups and meet new people, who could become future clients or contacts.

To build your customer base and increase sales of your products and services, you need to bring more traffic to your business website. LinkedIn is a great tool to make that happen, by engaging a community of professionals you would want to do business with.

LinkedIn Pages

If you have your own personal profile on LinkedIn, you can easily set up LinkedIn Pages for your business.

A completed page gets 30% more weekly page views than an incomplete one . To complete your page, there are eight criteria to fill in. When describing your organisation, include your vision, mission, values and a brief description of your products or services.

Make sure your page includes your logo, as well as terms and phrases relevant to your brand and what you have to offer. As LinkedIn members can search on keywords, this will help other members to find your business.

Once you have your page set up, you can start growing it and connecting with people. You can discover what content is trending with your audience, then create something similar which will also appeal to them. Customisable call-to-action (CTA) buttons will drive your audience to take specific actions, while analytics mean you can see who is following your page individually.

By getting your team on board, you can increase your organic reach further – as they share your best content with their own audience.

Want to find out how to increase sales using Linkedin? > >

What to post…

There’s no rules about what you should post on LinkedIn, but it stands to reason that it should be relevant to your business and the products or services you offer. On the other hand, blatantly pushing your business and hard-selling your products is frowned upon.

Keep your voice consistent to build trust with your audience, so they will get to know and understand your business and what it has to offer.

But just because your voice is consistent, it doesn’t mean you should add the same sort of post every time. Mix up your posts with links to relevant websites or news stories. Adding an image will make your post stand out better and will typically double the engagement you get. Video will do even better – it is five times more likely to start a conversation than any other type of content.

LinkedIn is about engagement and conversation. So ask questions of your followers to get them engaging with you and commenting on your posts. Make sure you respond to all of your followers’ comments and questions to build trust and help grow your following.

If you can, make your posts timely. Fit them in around the day’s news events, seasonal events like Christmas or Halloween or relevant awareness/ special days like World Mental Health Day, World Vegetarian Day, World Book Day or Black History Month. There are plenty of online sites which will let you know what is happening when, so you can always find a relevant date to tie in with.

How often to post?

For the best engagement, you should post daily to LinkedIn. But if you don’t think you can sustain that, it is better to post regularly , rather than post daily for three weeks, followed by nothing for three weeks. If you feel you can only sustain posting once or twice a week, that’s what you should aim for. Even posting just once a week will double your engagement compared to an organisation or individual who posts less often.

The same general rule applies to the sort of content you share too. While video is the most engaging form of post, it may also be the most expensive and time-consuming. So if you can’t post a video every day or every week, spread out your video content with other types of post.

Read our tips to bring more business to your website with Linkedin > >

Grow faster with LinkedIn ads

Whether you are just starting out, have launched a new product or are looking to grow your business, advertising on LinkedIn can help you reach the right professional audience.

LinkedIn advertising will reach a quality, professional audience of decision makers, budget holders and business owners. You can target your ads at exactly the right audience in terms of job title, company, industry, seniority and more. LinkedIn’s lookalike audiences function combines the requirements of your ideal customer with the platform’s extensive membership, to help you reach new professional audiences who are similar to your existing customers.

LinkedIn offers four types of advertising:

Sponsored content – appears in the LinkedIn feed of the professionals you want to reach, includes single image ads, video ads and carousel ads (interactive swipeable images in a single ad)
Message ads – allow you to send direct messages to your target audience for an immediate reaction and greater engagement
Dynamic ads – ads are automatically personalised for individual members of your target audience to really capture their attention
Text ads – simple pay-per-click (PPC) or cost-per-impression (CPM) adverts which are cost effective and easy to create

For each advertising campaign, you choose your own objective:

Brand awareness
Consideration – eg engagement, website visits, video views
Conversion – eg lead generation, website conversions, job applications

With LinkedIn advertising, you bid against other advertisers aiming to reach the same audience. You can choose from PPC (better for sales or lead generation) or CPM (better for brand awareness) pricing or choose message ads and only pay when your message is delivered.

You set your own budget, bid and schedule, and can start and stop your ads at any time.

Want to find out which social media is for you? > >

Use analytics

There’s no point posting regularly if it’s not reaching the right people. Keep track of your analytics daily by clicking on the analytics tab on your page. This will give you all the most important metrics you will need in the same place. You can review visitor traffic in a number of ways, including page views and unique visitors. You can also see clearly who is visiting the page based on a number of parameters, including industry, seniority and location.

Analytics will help you understand what sort of content works well, if any particular day of the week or time of day works better and where there are opportunities to improve. This will help you grow followers over time.

Whether you choose to pay to advertise on LinkedIn or to use it organically to build an audience, it is clear that LinkedIn is a great place to connect with other professionals and, from there, to build relationships. Many professionals will choose to check LinkedIn even before visiting a company website, so it is worth investing the time in building your presence on the platform, to make sure you company is one which others want to do business with.

Easy tips to boost your CRO

Mon, 16 Nov 2020 11:05:42 GMT

If your website has been getting lots of traffic lately, that’s great news. But is that traffic converting to actual sales?

If your site isn’t optimised for engagement, clicks and conversions (all leading to those valuable sales), all of the traffic in the world is pointless.

Conversion rate optimisation (CRO) is about improving your site to boost your conversions.

Most customers will carry out online research before making a purchase or signing up for a service, so the design, content and functionality of your website are all essential when it comes to the bottom line. Whatever you are aiming to achieve – an increase in sales or subscribers or something else – your site needs to encourage visitors to take the next step.

An important part of CRO is conducting careful analysis of how visitors behave on your site, so that you can identify any issues which are putting them off from converting.

Here’s our easy tips for boosting your CRO - pick the ones which will work best for you and will give you the quickest wins. If you’ve got the time, implement as many as you can. It will be time well spent…

Compelling CTAs

Your call-to-actions (CTAs) should encourage your visitors to take the action you want them to. Boost your chances by :

Personalising where possible – personalised CTAs have a 200% higher success rate than standard ones

Using action words – rather than bland words like ‘submit’, add action verbs to create immediacy and interest. Try ‘buy now’, ‘claim yours’ or ‘grab now’

Testing – not sure which version of a CTA will work best? Use A/B (or split) testing to try out different variations

Using CTAs everywhere – CTAs shouldn’t be just for your product pages. Every page, including your blog and landing pages, should have one. This will guide your visitors to take the next step you want them to take.

Don’t overdo the links

Links are necessary to take visitors onto the next stage of conversion – whether that is making a purchase, subscribing or something else. But if the links just take them from one page of your blog to a different page on your blog, they aren’t helping to achieve your aim.

Go through your site and ask yourself:

What is the point of this link?
Is it helpful to visitors?
Will it take them to a landing page which will help boost sales or trust in your brand?

If the answer to any of these questions is no, remove the link!

Focus on the headlines

The headline is the most important part of your landing pages and your blog. While eight out of 10 people will read the headline, only two out of 10 will go on to read the rest of the page. So the headline really needs to count!

Take time to come up with different headline ideas before choosing the best ones.

There are a few useful formulas to try:

Question. Solution: Having difficulty sleeping? Try these 10 breathing exercises
Do something in a particular time period: Pass your driving test in two months
Benefit. Benefit: Drive engagement. Make more sales

Buttons

When you look at a website, buttons stand out far more than links and are just asking to be clicked. So for your most important CTAs, design them to look like buttons. If you use buttons throughout your site, they should produce a 45 per cent increase in clicks.

You could increase clicks even further by using the right colour of button. But what is the right colour? That depends on your industry, your target audience and your own branding, so test a few options to see which colour is most effective.

Keep it concise!

You could paint a beautiful picture with your words. You could use all of the adjectives and adverbs under the sun, but your visitors just want you to get to the point.

So cut out the anecdotes and keep your writing focused, to avoid people leaving and heading for your competitor’s site.

Make sure your copy connects with your audience and their needs. Create messages which are intended specifically for your own target audience. The better you connect with your audience, the more likely they are to convert and to keep coming back.

Landing pages to answer every question

There is a fine line between keeping your pages concise and making them too short. You want your landing pages to give a visitor all of the information they need to answer every question they might have. The key is to keep the information essential, but make sure nothing is missing, so visitors don’t need to look elsewhere.

If you’re not sure whether longer landing pages will work for your business, test a long page against a shorter page and see which one brings the most conversions.

High quality images

Your images should enhance the look and feel of your site and your brand. Stock photos look cheesy and will no doubt have appeared on lots of other websites too. So invest some time and money in high quality images – whether you/ your team take them or you get a photographer to do the job for you.

Consider using people in your product photos, so that visitors can get an idea of how they work in daily life.

If you are selling a service, photos of the team on your website make you feel friendly and approachable and will help people to connect with your brand.

Use pop-ups (carefully!)

Pop-ups can be annoying, but used in the right way they can also help to increase conversions.

Good ways to use pop-ups effectively without irritating your visitors are:

Add a cookie so that each pop-up only appears once for each visitor

Add in a time delay, so visitors have time to browse before they get distracted by a pop-up

Make it easy to close the pop-up down – on mobiles and tablets, not just laptops

Vary the offers in your pop-ups to see which works best and to keep your visitors interested

Share reviews

More than nine out of 10 people check online reviews before buying a product. Genuine reviews are a powerful tool which provide reassurance and reduce risk to prospective customers. They also help you build trust with new visitors.

Add a selection of reviews on landing pages throughout your site. Make sure they are near the top of the page, so visitors don’t miss them.

Don’t forget to update them regularly, so it doesn’t look like you only had three good reviews back in 2016 and nothing since!

Use video

Whether it’s YouTube or TikTok, people love watching videos for both information and entertainment. So if you are unveiling a new product or demonstrating how to use an existing product, videos are a great way to keep your audience engaged – and make them more likely to buy.

Visitors will spend nearly twice as long on websites which have videos and are 64 per cent more likely to go ahead with a purchase after watching a video about a product.

Use a chat box

Live chat is becoming increasingly popular – and for good reason. Using a chat box increases conversions by 40 per cent.

Live chat is quick and personal and makes it easier for visitors to engage with your brand. In turn, that helps speed up their purchasing decisions and makes them less likely to look for an alternative product from a competitor.

Keep your pronouns friendly

When people arrive on your site, they are there because they want to know what your business can do for them.

But is your website all about you – or all about your customer? If it says ‘I’, ‘we’ or ‘our’ a lot, your site is too focused on yourself, not on what it can do for your visitors. Think about how you can turn sentences and statements around to ensure they are focused on your audience rather than yourself.

So rather than say: ‘Our product comes with a one-year guarantee’, say ‘You’ll get a one-year guarantee with your product’.

Don’t ask for too much information

When a visitor is ready to make a purchase or sign up for a subscription, don’t lose them by asking for too much information. Faced with a form with too many boxes to fill in, many visitors will choose to leave.

So ask for only the essential information – name and email address is usually enough to start with.

Don’t force customers to register either, always offer a guest checkout option, so that they can make a purchase quickly with a minimum of information.

Consistency with your ads

If you’ve got PPC Google Ads or maybe Facebook Ads running, make sure your advertising and your landing pages give a consistent message – your ad copy should promise what your site delivers.

By providing accurate and consistent information through your ads, you will cut bounce rates and increase both dwell times and conversion rates on your site.

Don’t forget SEO

CRO is all about converting visitors into customers, but how do you get the visitors in the first place? Search engine optimisation (SEO) is what brings many of your visitors to the site, before CRO works to move them onto the next step. So make sure copy across your site is relevant to your brand and products, and meets the demand from your prospective customers.

Not only does SEO bring you the visitor numbers, it also brings you the qualified leads who are interested in what you have to offer. Without the right visitors, all your CRO work will go to waste.

You can’t boost your CRO overnight, but by following these tips you should see an increase in visitors who go on to take the next steps on your website and ultimately make a difference to your bottom line.

Google Ads vs Facebook Ads: Which is better?

Wed, 11 Nov 2020 10:32:18 GMT

We’ve written a lot on this blog about Google Ads and what it can do for your business.

But maybe you prefer Facebook Ads or are curious to try them?

These two platforms dominate the online advertising industry. So here we take a look at the difference, and which is the better advertising platform.

With limited budgets, it is important to make the right decision to give you the best possible return on investment (ROI). But clearly, there won’t be a straightforward answer which will suit all businesses.

Every company is different. They sell different products and services and are targeting different people. So maybe the question we need to ask is: Google Ads or Facebook Ads – which is better FOR YOU?

Because the answer to the question really depends on your business, your audience and your goals…

Google Ads

With more than three billion searches a day worldwide, it makes a lot of sense to advertise on Google.

Google Ads is a pay-per-click (PPC) or ‘paid search’ platform, which means that you pay everyone time someone clicks on your ad. Ads are shown to users who are actively searching on Google for something you have to sell eg ‘swimming lessons Gloucestershire’ or ‘garden furniture Cotswolds’. You bid on keywords and the more you bid, the higher your ads will appear on searches. Ads will appear above organic searches.

Google Ads is a really good choice, because it will give you an immediate return on your investment – finding new customers and making sales straightaway.

Facebook Ads

Facebook has 2.27 billion active monthly users and is still the biggest social media site. Facebook Ads is ‘paid social’ advertising, and spend on Facebook Ads accounts for 25% of all online ad spend.

Facebook Ads will help you find new customers who are interested to find out more about what your business has to offer, but are unlikely to buy straightaway.

While Facebook doesn’t show people ads for things they are actively searching for, it does understand its users very well, because it collects a lot of data. Taking into account things like the pages a person engages with, their date of birth, their location and their friends, it will show users ads for things they will almost certainly be interested in.

Facebooks Ads provides a wide range of targeting options based on demographics and behaviour. For it to work for your business, you have to really understand your target customer – by creating a ‘lookalike audience’ which replicates your current or ideal customers to create an audience to target with your ads.

Facebook Ads is incredibly affordable , particularly when targeting a local area, so it is cost-effective for small businesses like coffee shops, hair salons and convenience stores.

What is the difference?

The main difference between Google Ads and Facebook Ads is how products are shown to potential customers. In effect, Google Ads helps you find new customers, while Facebook helps new customers find you.

While Google shows relevant ads to people who are searching for a product or service, Facebook shows them to people based on their interests. Google Ads are focused on visitors clicking a link and making a purchase, while Facebook Ads are more about building up brand awareness.

In terms of appearance, Google Ads on the search network are largely text based, whereas Facebook Ads are far more visual , making the most of striking images which fit seamlessly into a user’s news feed.

Although they are in competition for your advertising budget, they work in different ways and can complement each other very well when used together – to give you maximum visibility, build brand awareness and loyalty, and increase sales.

Which is better?

For a business owner, particularly a small business owner, the answer to the question of whether Google Ads or Facebook Ads is better is going to be the one which generates the most profit.

Facebook Ads are popular with small business owners, as they give them the opportunity to pinpoint their target customers and only advertise to people who are likely to purchase their product or service.

But for most businesses, we have found that Google Ads is the best option. If you are a new business looking to make sales right now, Google Ads will give you a better return on your investment. The cost is usually a bit higher, but your ads are shown to people who are actively searching for what you have to sell. And if you target them effectively, in terms of both the type of person and the geographical area you are trying to reach, they can prove to be very cost effective.

While for us, Google Ads just has the edge as the ‘better’ form of advertising, it isn’t always quite as straightforward as that. The right answer depends on what you have to sell, what you hope to achieve from your advertising and the audience you are trying to reach. Consider the total value your advertising can bring to your business – in both sales and building brand awareness.

Word of mouth is really essential to business growth and nothing does this better than Facebook. The ROI for Facebook Ads may be harder to quantify than with Google, as it generates less specific sales, but by creating brand awareness and building a community of fans and likeminded people, it will lead to sales further down the line.

If you have the budget for it, Facebook Ads should definitely have a place in your marketing. It will give you a better understanding of your target audience’s social behaviours and allow you to grow a social community around your company.

If you can afford it, the best answer for your business could be to use both forms of advertising, so you are covering all bases, in terms of sales and brand awareness. Studies have shown that Facebook Ads lead to a significant immediate growth in branded Google searches, almost as soon as a user has seen an ad. So using them together really will give you the best of both worlds.

Effective web design for ecommerce

Mon, 02 Nov 2020 08:59:41 GMT

Whether your business sells completely online, supports a physical store or stores, in order for your eCommerce site to be effective the design has to be right.

To make sure you are converting visitors into sales, your website needs to look good and function smoothly – giving the best possible user experience.

When customers come to your site, they may just be looking to buy a product. But your aim should be to go a step further to ensure they return and become repeat customers. For this to happen, customers should want to buy into a brand they can relate to. The best eCommerce sites, in all sectors, share the values of a brand - not just the products it is selling.

You could be designing your very first ecommerce site or updating an existing one, but the advice is always the same. To make the most of your web design, you need to invest time, energy and money into the key pages on your site – your homepage, product page and checkout page.

And if you’re not sure where to start, start with the thing which is working least well. So if you have a high abandonment rate at checkout, work on your checkout page first, before moving on to the other key pages.

If you’ve got the time and the budget, other important areas to focus on are: category page; about us page, search results page; log in forms; and email newsletter forms.

If you use pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, like Google Ads, you should also focus on your landing pages. You may choose to build a new landing page with a new advertising campaign, or build them as part of your overall web design.

Homepage

The homepage of your ecommerce site is usually the first thing a potential customer will come across. And it will only take them a few seconds to decide whether your company is one they want to do business with.

So your homepage needs to show them how your brand is different and how it can meet their needs. This is the first step towards a visitor becoming a customer, then a repeat customer who is loyal to your brand.

If your homepage is too busy, with too many products and too much information, it is likely to have the opposite effect to the one you are looking for. Instead, your homepage design should show off your best products in a way which is easy to navigate – so visitors can move onto more detail on your product pages.

Your images need to be powerful and of the highest quality. Make sure you take your own pictures and avoid stock photos. Alternatively, you could use video to attract attention – as the eye is always drawn to moving objects.

Navigation should be simple and clearly visible. If you have a large product range, you should use high-level categories that are easy to navigate eg ‘hoodies’, ‘jeans’, ‘shirts’ and ‘footwear’ or ‘patio sets’, ‘garden benches’, ‘sun loungers’ and ‘gazebos’.

Other things to remember:

If you have any special promotions running, make sure they are clear on your homepage – and make them timely to create a sense of urgency and encourage shoppers to buy now.

Ensure you have links to key information, like your returns policy, delivery information and company contact details on the homepage.

Whatever you are selling, it is essential that your homepage design is compatible with smartphones, desktops and tablets.

Product pages

For many ecommerce sites, your product pages will also be your landing pages. And they are among the most viewed pages on a website. This is where you should take away a visitor’s uncertainty and convince them to buy.

An effective product page on an ecommerce site should answer all of a visitor’s questions and give them all the information they need to become a customer. Without good product pages, your checkout page will become virtually redundant.

Your product page needs to jump out at visitors and keep them engaged, or they won’t go on to buy. You need high quality images which stand out. And if you can afford to include a number of images of each product, a 360-view of them or the option to change the colours (eg for an item of clothing), that is even better.

Think about what you want to know yourself before you go ahead and buy a product and make sure your own website gives your potential customers the same information. Your product descriptions should be clear and concise and give all the reasons why a visitor would want to choose your product – which could be that it is machine washable or that it is made from sustainable sources, along with things like sizing details and materials or ingredients.

Other things to remember:

Make it easy to buy with a very clear ‘Buy’ or ‘Add to basket’ button, so that your visitors can’t miss it. Even a few seconds of searching can be enough to send people to another site.

Just as with your homepage, avoid cluttering your pages with too much information in one place. Leave plenty of white space.

If you have a large product range, add filters which allow potential customers to narrow down their choices by price, size, reviews or something else.

Checkout page

The checkout process is the last step on a customer’s buying journey through your ecommerce site. They’ve got an item (or maybe several items) in their basket, but will they enter their payments details and go ahead and buy, or will they just abandon their purchase?

Entering your personal and payment details into a website requires an enormous level of trust. Your homepage and your product pages could be perfect, but if a customer feels any uncertainty at checkout, all of your hard work will go to waste.

So it is a good idea to have a trust badge on your checkout page (some firms even choose to have them on their home pages too). A trust badge or seal lets visitors know that your site is legitimate and that any data collected will be collected securely. A number of surveys have shown that trust badges increase sales. Safe checkout badges which are trusted by customers include Norton, VeriSign, LifeLock, PayPal and Shopify.

But it’s not just adding the payment details which can put people off making a purchase – the cost of delivery and the time taken for a delivery can also change their minds. That’s why it is important to have that information easy to access on the home page, as well as the checkout page.

Not only will a poor checkout page result in you losing this particular sale, it will lead to a negative impression of your company which means a customer is less likely to come back in future.

Other things to remember:

Your checkout pages should be clear and easy to follow, preferably with no need to scroll. Delivery costs should be clear and added to your total where you can see them.

Inevitably, some people will struggle with the checkout process or have a question they need to answer before going ahead. So add contact information, such as a chat function, at the bottom of your checkout page.

Customers want to checkout quickly, so give the option for them to register, so that their information is already there when they make their next purchase and they don’t need to add all of their payment and shipping information again – unless they want to.

Your basket should be clearly visible throughout the checkout process, but you should also make it easy for users to go back to the product pages to check the items in their basket.

Asking for payment information shouldn’t happen until you have asked customers to confirm that they are happy with the contents of their basket.

When it comes to payment and delivery, make sure you only ask for information which is essential for fulfilling the order. Respecting a customer’s privacy helps build trust and makes them more likely to come back to you in future.

An effective ecommerce site is a careful balance between style and function. It needs to both look good and work smoothly and intuitively. By focusing on optimising key areas of your site, you should see more visitors go on to become customers and more customers becoming loyal to your brand.

Can Google Ads work for small businesses?

Mon, 26 Oct 2020 12:28:06 GMT

When it comes to web searches, small businesses have to fight to get noticed.

Your business isn’t Amazon or Nike or Coca Cola. Maybe you are operating in a small local area or selling a very niche product, so how can you expect to compete with the big boys?

You may be surprised to discover that, even for a small business, Google Ads’ pay-per-click (PPC) advertising service can make a real difference to how your company ranks in searches.

Google Ads is suitable for businesses with any budget and you can spend as much or as little as you like. You can limit your spending to ensure you don’t go over budget and adjust it as often as you need to.

So what are the advantages of Google Ads for small businesses?

Fast results

While it is always important to optimise your website for SEO, getting organic results is a slow process, with your content not ranking on Google for many months. For small businesses, it is almost impossible to beat big companies to the top of the rankings with SEO alone.

With Google Ads, as soon as your ads are live, they will be displayed. And, depending on how specific your keywords are ( long tail keywords of three to five words are best for small businesses ) you could instantly be displayed at the top of the search ranking for the keywords you have bid on.

Google Ads is a level playing field which allows you to compete with big companies. If you have bid the most to rank for ‘swimming classes Gloucestershire’, you will appear at the top of the ranking, regardless of the size of your company.

Reach customers at the right time

PPC advertising means you only pay when someone clicks your ad – and with Google Ads (which used to be known as Google Adwords), you can reach customers just when they are searching for what you have to offer.

With more traditional advertising, your adverts are reaching people who probably don’t want to see them, but Google Ads are only shown to people who are actively searching for what you have to offer. Anyone searching for the terms you choose eg ‘online flower delivery UK’ or ‘swimming classes Gloucestershire’ is more likely to come to your site and make a purchase after seeing your ads.

Flexibility

With Google Ads, you don’t just target keywords. You can target a particular audience eg mums in their 30s or men in a higher income bracket and you don’t have to choose between them, because you can target a number of audiences. You can even decide what time you would like your ads to be shown and on which devices.

Particularly important for small businesses, is that you can target certain locations – which could be a town, a county or a region. Targeting a particular location can help you get more customers from your local community, which is especially important if you have a bricks and mortar business, like a coffee shop or beauty salon.

Choose your landing page

One big advantage of Google Ads is that it lets you choose your landing page. If your ad is for your toddler swimming classes in Gloucestershire, you don’t want someone to click on your ad and end up on your home page or, even worse, a page about your adult swim classes in Bristol.

Landing on the right page first time will make visitors far more likely to go ahead and make a purchase.

Monitor your results

As a small business, it doesn’t make sense to throw money at ineffective advertising and, with Google Ads, you won’t need to. You can easily see which ads are working (leading to clicks and visits) and which aren’t, so you can adjust them as you need to.

When you know what is working well, you can decide where to allocate your budget for the future, to use your advertising in the most effective way.

Get ahead of the competition

Google Ads allows you to compete directly with your competition, even if your competition is a much bigger company. In fact, it’s worth taking a look at your competitors’ advertising to see if there is anything they are missing – because those gaps in their marketing are opportunities for you.

Look at the keywords your competitors are ranking for. Can you rank for the same keywords? If you bid more, you can rank higher for them and increase your own clicks and sales. Some companies will even bid on a competitors’ name, so that they will benefit from some of the traffic when someone types the rival company name into Google.

Even better, if your click-through rate is much higher than your competitors’ rate, you will improve your quality score with Google, which means you pay less for your clicks, helping to improve your return on investment (ROI).

Retargeting

One of the real strengths of Google Ads is its retargeting function. So once someone has been on your site, you can retarget your ads to them.

Visiting your site in the first place shows that they are interested in what you have to offer. Just because they didn’t buy first time around, it doesn’t mean that they wouldn’t consider buying from you at a later date.

So use Google Ads to retarget them – basically follow them round the web with your ads. It helps with a person’s awareness of your brand and is a reminder to them to go back to your site to finish what they were doing before. You can use this function either on a Google Search or on the Google Display Network (ads that appear on other sites on the web).

Google Ads do cost money and small businesses especially need to watch the bottom line. But if you are careful, they can be very cost effective indeed, particularly when compared to other forms of advertising.

To make the most of your Google Ads, it is sensible to spend time preparing your messages and landing pages clear before you start paying for your ads. Google produces plenty of material to help you make the most of your ads, so you can avoid any nasty surprises.

However small your business, Google Ads can definitely help with sales and business growth.

Web design trends for 2020-21

Mon, 19 Oct 2020 10:13:29 GMT

Ever look at a website and think it looks old or out-of-date?

Web design is a key part of a potential customer’s first impression of your business, and great design can help you increase sales. But you have to stay up-to-date!

Web design trends evolve and change rapidly and today’s out-of-date was probably cutting edge four years ago. If you haven’t reviewed and updated your website design for two or three years, it is probably due for a refresh.

Some trends will always be popular, like minimalist pages with large images or pages with lots of white space. But other trends come and go. Some will work for your business and some won’t, but it is worth checking them all out to make sure you are moving with the times.

So what are the web design trends for 2020 and 2021?

*We know that web design is about so much more than the appearance, but we’re just going to focus on appearance in this post. We will look at the functional stuff elsewhere.

P erfectly imperfect illustration

Imperfect, hand-drawn illustrations inject personality into website – in complete contrast to the clean and stark designs of recent years. These images can show off the personality of your brand and help you stand out from the competition.

Hand-drawn images are positive and can really brighten up someone’s day. And if you’ve brightened up someone’s day, they are more likely to take a closer look at your products or services.

If your illustrations are a bit messy, even better! They make a refreshing change from the rather bland stock photos used on so many websites. As you are creating your illustrations from scratch, they can more accurately reflect your company and its branding than stock images can.

Asymmetric layout

For a long time, website designs have been based on a grid. It makes it easy for a user to read and to focus on the key elements – but it also means a lot of websites look very similar.

Asymmetry, just like the hand drawn illustrations, will make your site a bit different and add some fun. Of course it is still important to make sure that your page is easy to read and navigate. The eye will always be drawn to the largest elements of the page, so a designer simply needs to increase the size of the areas you really want visitors to focus on.

D ark mode

Dark mode (basically a black screen with white text or a subtle variation of that) looks modern and effortlessly cool. It’s great for making colours and designs stand out to give truly dynamic design.

But it’s also practical too – it’s easier on tired eyes in low light conditions which have been staring at a screen all day.

W hite space

White space isn’t a new trend and it is likely it won’t be going anywhere soon. White space is about leaving space on your site/ page and giving it room to breathe. It is more relaxing and less overwhelming for visitors, as content stands out better and is easier to read and digest.

Interestingly, white space doesn’t have to be white. It can be any colour. It is just about leaving sufficient space between the elements on your page.

3 D design

3D website design is a way of bringing your products and brand to life like never before.

3D design will always attract visitors – and get them to stick around for longer. While it was an expensive option in the past, the price tag is coming down and is making it more accessible for smaller companies to integrate into their web design.

C reating depth

If you don’t want to go the whole hog with 3D design – or it is still a bit pricey for your needs – you can create depth with shadows and floating elements on your page. Soft shadows and floating elements can be used with graphics, text and photos and give a toned down 3D appearance, helping to bring your page to life.

These additional design elements will help your site stand out when compared to your competitors’ classic flat web designs.

C olours that glow

Duotone (two colour) colour schemes have been popular in web design for a few years now. They are a great way of reinforcing brand identity and to liven up a sometimes pretty basic design.

Duotone keeps reinventing itself and, this year, the colours are getting brighter and braver. With the trend for dark mode, neon blues, pinks and purples almost glow in the dark. Using duotone, you can transform almost any image to fit with your company’s branding.

But make sure you look into the psychology of colour before making any big changes to your colour palette. Some colours just won’t work for certain brands, products and services – and most importantly their customers.

Mix it up

Don’t think you need to stick with all photos or all graphics on your page – combining the two will create a really customised message. Your photos can be of products or people and should support your branding to make your site stand out from the crowd.

Use your own original graphics on top of real photographs (rather than the stock images everyone uses) to create visuals which are memorable. Mixing elements together can help you bring bland-looking product photos to life or help communicate more complicated messages.

Minimalist design and navigation

We’ve all got used to looking at websites on smartphones, but now people are starting to look at them on smartwatches too. A smaller screen means a much simpler site is needed.

A picture says a thousand words, and images should be big, beautiful and powerful - and able to get your message across.

Large images and a minimum of text are combined with minimalist navigation to help users get around a site easily. The less time they have to think about how they navigate your site, the more time they will spend on it.

It’s important to review and refresh your website design every few years. Not all of these trends will be right for every brand, but it is worth considering them, as updating your site’s design can have a positive impact on sales.

If you are looking for a refresh of your site, but aren’t sure where to start, contact our experienced team at Cotswold Web.

The importance of good web design during Covid-19

Thu, 15 Oct 2020 07:56:10 GMT

When you run a business online, it is always important to keep your web design fresh and make sure it adapts to both the latest trends and the latest technology. Never has that been more important than during the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic.

When business and life as we know it was locked down in March 2020, we all hoped or assumed it would be over in a matter of weeks. Now we know that coronavirus is here for much longer – as is its impact on business.

First impressions are everything, so your website needs to be the best it can be. If you have been putting off a website redesign, there can be no better time to improve it than right now.

The businesses which are surviving, or even thriving, during this time are the ones which have been able to adapt. If you haven’t reviewed and updated your web design as a result of the pandemic, what are you waiting for?

Covid-19 has brought more customers to websites than ever before and changed the shape of shopping, probably forever. Can your web design cope?

Having an out of date, slow website will hinder all of your hard work to promote your products and services. To thrive in a post-Covid world, you need to make sure that your website is up-to-date, stylish and ready to convert all those potential new customers.

Companies which are able to move more of their business online are the ones which are adapting to the crisis better than others. While online sales of both products and services have been increasing rapidly for a number of years, the coronavirus pandemic has sped up that process dramatically.

Good design is good for business

Web design is responsible for most first impressions of your business – and great design can improve your sales numbers.

Successful businesses have prioritised their online experiences – and you don’t have to be a big company to have a great website . A professional looking website, which works in an intuitive and customer-frien dly way will allow smaller companies to compete with the big boys in their sector.

If you don’t have the know-how in-house to improve your website design, paying a professional company like Cotswold Web to do it for you is a no-brainer. Between us, we’ve got years of experience in web design. We stay on top of the latest trends and technology, so we can give you the best advice – and design the best possible site for your business!

Good web design creates a good impression of your business, which in turn gives your customers and potential customers confidence in what you are selling. It can give you that edge over other businesses in your sector and make you look like a bigger and better company than your competitors.

A strong brand

When reviewing your website, ask yourself whether it shows a strong and consistent brand. You want people to like your company and your products – and you want them to keep coming back for more. Is your brand instantly recognisable from your website and across your social media, right through to the packaging of your products? If it isn’t, you need to work on that as a priority.

It is consistency across your channels that will help to secure repeat business, increase awareness and help to establish your company as a key player in your industry.

Focus on user experience (UX)

For a business to come through the pandemic relatively unscathed, you need a website which doesn’t just look good, but which gives the user a smooth and uninterrupted experience.

Think about:

· Fast page load

· Uncluttered, easy to navigate pages

· Relevant, easy to read content

· Optimised for mobile

Again, this is where it would be worth calling in the professionals. Money invested now on your user experience will be money well spent, as it is an investment in increased future sales.

Improve your rankings

Good web design isn’t just about your colour palette, your fonts and your functionality, it’s about nailing your SEO. Pandemic or not, people still aren’t keen to wade through pages and pages of Google to find your site. So you need to be one of the first search results on the rankings to ensure your site is visible to the audience you want to reach.

If your products and services are particularly niche, or if they are confined to a fairly small geographical area, make sure you are using those really relevant keywords on your site, so that you come up in searches. So if you specialise in ‘rattan garden furniture’ in the Cotswolds rather than just ‘garden furniture’ in the UK or if you provide toddler swim classes in Gloucestershire, make sure those long tail keywords (phrases of three to five words) are prominent on your site. That way, the next time someone searches specifically for ‘rattan garden furniture Cotswolds’, your business will appear higher on Google.

Over time, getting your SEO right will help to boost your site’s domain authority and keep it above the competition on searches.

Still open for business

While footfall at bricks and mortar stores remains far lower than usual, it’s important that you show your customers that you are still open for business. Show that you value your customers whether they engage with you through your website, through social media or through a physical shop by continuing to communicate with them.

Update your website regularly with new content – from blogposts and videos to photos of your latest products.

If Covid-19 is continuing to affect business – whether in availability of stock or delivery times due to social distancing in warehouses – update your website to let customers know. A clear message as a header on your site will save visitors from trawling your site for information and they will value you taking the time to communicate with them.

There has never been a more important time to improve your website design and strategy. Getting your web design right during the Covid-19 pandemic won’t just help you to survive now, it will help future proof your business over the coming months and years.

How to use Google Ads during Covid-19

Wed, 07 Oct 2020 07:35:31 GMT

When business and life as we know it was locked down in March 2020, we all thought the coronavirus pandemic would be over in a matter of weeks. Now we know that Covid-19 is going to be here for much longer – as is its impact on business.

The pandemic is a unique and critical challenge to businesses. Sadly, for some companies, it will mean closure. But it represents a great opportunity for others.

One of the positives which have come out of Covid-19 is the huge rise in online shopping. The crisis is expected to add £5.3bn to UK ecommerce sales in 2020 . At the end of 2020 the average items per order increased by 60% during COVID-19 and 40% of consumers report they’re more comfortable with digital technology than before lockdown . So there is definitely money to be made for the right business.

But how do you become ‘the right business’ in a hugely competitive market – especially when it’s thought that £2bn of that extra cash will go straight to Amazon.

To make sure your company, your products and your services are seen by the right people at the right time, you need to advertise. And there is no better way to advertise online than through Google Ads. Google Ads convert 50% better than organic traffic , with most firms earning double their advertising spend through them.

Many businesses will have seen reduced spend on their products and services in recent months. As a result, you might be reluctant to spend too much on advertising and feel that it is potentially money wasted. So you need to think carefully about how you use Google Ads during the pandemic to make sure you get the balance right.

Refocus your spend

If you’ve noticed any products which haven’t been selling well during Covid-19, there is no real point in throwing more money in advertising them at the moment.

Instead, refocus your advertising spending on the products which are already selling well to see if they could sell even better. Having saved money on advertising your underperforming products, consider increasing your maximum bid on your big selling products to generate more clicks. The more you are prepared to pay for each click, the higher you will move up the rankings – and the more traffic you will generate.

With Google Ads, you don’t commit to a contract or fixed terms, so you aren’t weighed down with a long-term commitment. And you can adjust your budget as many times as you want. As businesses begin the long, slow recovery from Covid-19, it is an easy way to keep your costs down, while still getting the results you are looking for.

Target the right audience

When you’re trying to be careful with your spending, you need to focus it in the right direction, so make sure you target the right audience!

Who is your product aimed at – single men, mums in their 40s, high earners, sports fans, older couples?

When you set up your Google Ads, you can add audience targeting to reach people based on their interests and habits, what they’re actively searching for or how they’ve interacted with your business in the past. You can then create a single or combined audience you want to target with your ads.

As you are saving money on not advertising to the wrong people, you may be able to increase your bids to reach the right people and get ahead of the competition.

Segment your products

To get better results from your Google Ads, segment your stock into either individual products (eg best-selling sweatshirt or large garden umbrella) or product types (eg all jumpers or all garden accessories).

If garden accessories are selling far better than garden furniture, separate these best-selling products and increase your bids on them. Also increase your bids on products that might sell in bulk- either because people want to stock up in one go eg on a lot of new plants for the garden or because products tend to sell well together eg a garden table to match the garden chairs.

By segmenting your ads, you can see more clearly what is working and what isn’t. From there, you can decide where to target spending and where to cut down or stop spending altogether.

Attract previous customers back

Rather than investing all of your time and money into attracting new visitors to your website, focus on attracting previous customers and visitors back. This is usually cheaper than focusing on new potential customers – and returning customers are more likely to buy from you.

Remarketing Lists for Search Ads (RLSAs) is a Google Ads feature that allows advertisers to tailor their search campaigns based on whether a user has previously visited their website – and which pages they viewed. Visitors will only see your ads when they are actively searching for your keywords on Google. When used well, RLSAs can result in more efficient use of advertising spend and a better return on your investment (ROI).

Remarketing works in a similar way to RLSAs, but shares ads when people aren’t actively searching for your keywords or products. Your ads appear on the Google Display Network when people who have previously visited your site browse Google or any of its partner websites.

Make the most of location settings

Covid-19 has kept more people in their local areas and choosing to shop local. It has also led to challenges with social distancing in warehouses slowing down delivery times. So if you have a company which delivers mainly to a local area, now is the time to focus on that more than ever.

Increase your bids on advertising for the local area and cut back on your spend nationally or globally. Or maybe the only way for your business to stay afloat is to reach a wider area? In that case, increase your spend regionally, nationally or globally.

Negative keywords

Regularly reviewing the search terms which trigger your ads can help you identify where you are wasting your budget.

Once you’ve identified the terms which are giving you little or no return, you can add them into your Google Ads advertising campaign as negative keywords. This means your ads will no longer show when people search on those keywords, potentially saving you money and also boosting the quality of your ads through improved relevance.

The pandemic is set to be here for some time to come and businesses need to do everything they can to stay afloat.

Making these adjustments to your Google Ads spend is a good way to save money and improve the return on your spend during Covid-19. But it is also good practise for the future and something businesses should stay on top of, even when the pandemic is over.

Why Google Ads is still a powerful marketing tool

Tue, 08 Sep 2020 11:38:50 GMT

As business and the economy slowly start to recover from the Covid-19 pandemic, many companies are going to need all the help they can get to get back on their feet. If you’re not sure where to get that additional boost you will need, you should look no further than the might of Google Ads (previously known as Google AdWords).

Whether you are an entirely online business, you have a bricks and mortar store, or you have both, Google Ads is a powerful marketing tool. It allows you to reach audiences that are interested in the products and services you offer and can help increase traffic to your website, online sales, visits to a physical store or calls to your business.

Google Ads is a pay-per-click (PPC) platform, so you pay a fee every time a visitor clicks on your ad. It is used by big multinational companies, but it is also used by lots of small local businesses.

If you’re looking for a marketing solution which is easy to scale up, Google Ads make it easy for you. With Google Ads, you can create online adverts for your business through multiple channels, including: Google searches, Google Shopping, partner websites (through Google Display Network), YouTube and more.

So why it is so effective?

Huge Reach

People use Google to get the answers to their questions. In fact, worldwide, people search Google an incredible five billion times a day.

Among those searches will be people looking for solutions to problems that you can solve with your products or services. If you can help them find the answer through your ads, they are more likely to choose your business rather than one of your competitors.

The Right Keywords

To make sure your Google Ads reach the right audience, you bid on keywords. There are millions of keywords available, giving you access to an almost unlimited audience. And the more specific your keywords, the more likely you are to reach exactly the right people.

Long-tail keywords are phrases of three to five words. They are less general and also cheaper for you to bid on. And the best thing about a long-tail keyword is that people who are searching for something very specific eg ‘gardening services in Gloucestershire’ rather than just ‘gardener’ have more intent to buy what you are offering.

Intent to Buy

When you advertise with Google Ads, you are reaching people who have been searching for the answer to their problems. The intent to buy is there and, when your advert reaches them, it is helping them find the answer they’re looking for.

Compare that to when you advertise on social media, where you are advertising to people who want to see what their friends have been up to and look at some pretty pictures. These aren’t people who want to see your adverts or buy your products.

So potential customers are far more likely to buy through a Google Ad than through a social media ad they didn’t choose to see.

A Budget That Works For You

Google Ads aren’t expensive. You set your own daily budget and maximum bids, so you can be sure that you aren’t spending too much. And you can adjust your budget as many times as you want.

With Google Ads, you don’t commit to a contract or fixed terms, so you aren’t weighed down with a long-term marketing budget. As businesses begin the long, slow recovery from Covid-19, it is an easy way to keep your costs down, while still getting the results you are looking for.

Once you have a PPC campaign which is working well, you could increase your daily spend to generate more clicks. As keywords are ranked on a bidding system, the more you are prepared to pay for each click, the higher you will move up the rankings – and the more traffic you will generate. Increasing your bids will mean you attract as many visitors as you want – or can afford.

And if an ad is underperforming, you can stop it instantly rather than waste money on keeping it going. You can also pause a campaign and bring it back later. All of this gives you lots of flexibility and the ability to keep strict control of your finances.

Much Quicker Than SEO

While search engine optimisation (SEO) is the backbone of many of the most popular sites, it takes work and time. The posts and pages you see at the top of a Google search are well-written and optimised and have built up quality backlinks over time. They were most likely written by a staff member who was employed specifically for the task or an expensive freelance SEO expert.

This isn’t easy for a small company to compete with, and plenty of businesses will never see their own pages or posts ranking on the first page of Google.

But a well-targeted Google Ad, particularly one with a long-tail keyword, can see your business leapfrog all of these well-written pages on a Google search. Even better, you could see results within literally minutes of starting a campaign.

Get Ahead Of The Competition

Whatever industry you are in, there will always be fierce competition. But, if you are prepared to spend the money, Google Ads will help you get ahead of your competitors.

If your competition is spending a lot of money on SEO to get to the top of an organic Google search, you can rank above them with a PPC campaign, just by bidding enough on a keyword.

And if they are running their own Google Ads, you can outbid them on a keyword to push them below you on the rankings. They will lose visits and clicks, which will divert to your website instead. Outbidding your competitors on Google Ads is basically stealing their traffic and their business.

Amazing Analytics

You will never again be left wondering whether your marketing budget is really being used in the best possible way, because you can keep track of how your Google Ads are performing with the analytics built into the software. With Google Ads’ analytics, you can see the average cost per click of an ad and keep tabs on its position and conversion rate.

This means you can quickly make decisions on how to spend your money for the best return on investment (ROI). If you’ve got a high converting keyword, the analytics will show you that and you can take the decision to up your spend on it – or to stop spending on an ad which isn’t performing well.

Brand Awareness

Even if a potential customer isn’t ready to buy the first time they see your ad, Google Ads will help to create brand awareness. Use your ads effectively with images and extensions (additional information at no extra cost, such as promotions, your phone number or your location) and potential customers will start to recognise your brand.

The more they see your adverts, the more they will feel they understand your brand and what you have to offer. When the time is right for them to buy, they are more likely to choose your company over a competitor.

Different Bidding Strategies

Companies don’t just use Google Ads to make sales, which is why Google offers different bidding strategies to make the most of your ROI.

The different bidding strategies are:

CPM bidding – which means ‘cost per thousand viewable impressions’. This is what Google recommends for building brand awareness. You decide how much you are willing to spend for 1,000 people to see your advert. This is only available on the Google Display Network, rather than through searches.
CPC bidding – this is the best way to drive traffic to your website.
CPA bidding – is what Google recommends for businesses which want to generate sales or sign-ups.

If you want to boost brand awareness, you will be able to share your ads with more people than if your aim is to make sales. But if you are focused on sales, Google won’t show your ads to a mass audience, instead it will focus on people who are interested in your products and services and more likely to convert.

So if you were wondering whether Google Ads is still relevant and still as powerful as ever in 2020, the answer is yes. It really does have something for everyone – whatever the size of your business and budget, whichever sector or industry you work in and whatever your advertising goals.

Google Ads allows you to reach an audience of thousands or even millions, yet it remains very cost-effective. The ability to start, stop and adjust your bids and campaigns at any time means it is very flexible – just what we all need as businesses work to get back on their feet following Covid-19.

Why you should use ThriveCart for services, memberships, B2B and high value products

Tue, 21 Jul 2020 09:59:50 GMT

As an online business, you know how much work goes into attracting visitors to your site and turning them into customers.

After all that work, you really don’t want to lose them at the last minute because of a weak link in your sales funnel.

Many companies are losing 40% of sales at checkout, because customers are encountering a badly designed, confusing or even downright scary checkout page.

ThriveCart doesn’t just improve your basket and checkout to prevent these lost sales, it can actually boost sales by persuading customers to buy more from you at the last minute.

ThriveCart isn’t the sort of online shopping basket we are used to seeing on Amazon and most shopping sites. You don’t add clothes and gadgets to a ThriveCart basket. Instead, it focuses on offering one core product or solution to your target audience.

Here we will look at all the advantages of ThriveCart for your business, and touch on the businesses it won’t work for.

We will look at how it boosts sales, its ease of use and its value compared to competitors like SamCart and ClickFunnels.

At the end, we’re sure you will agree with us that ThriveCart is the way forward for businesses selling services, memberships, B2B and high value physical products.

Who needs ThriveCart?

ThriveCart will work for you, if you are selling:

Online courses or digital products like ebooks – works seamlessly with a course or membership platform and the bump and upsell offers are perfect for online courses

Memberships, subscriptions or recurring products – supports whatever pricing plans you want to use, including one-off payments, regular payments (weekly, monthly, annually etc), free trials and even pay your own price

Coaching or consultancy services – easy to collect payments and choice of different payment models

Some high value physical products – range of payment options and can collect delivery information, names and phone numbers

SAAS

Software

Events

There are many advantages to ThriveCart if you are selling products or service in these areas. It is easy to set up, with no knowledge of coding needed, and it is easy for your customers to use. It integrates with lots of payment platforms, including Apple Pay, PayPal and Google Pay for a seamless billing experience.

ThriveCart also integrates with software you are already using on your site – from your email marketing platform to membership platforms and Wordpress CMS platforms. Just some of the software it will integrate with includes AWeber, MailChimp, HubSpot and Zapier. It will even work with Shopify.

Upsell and downsell

One thing which really sets ThriveCart apart, is the way it helps you to upsell using profit-boosting ‘bump offers’ – a quick add-on purchase offered to customers right on the checkout page.

These are quick and easy to set up and proven to boost profits with minimal effort.

40% of customers buying online through ThriveCart have bought something extra with a bump offer – adding thousands of pounds of extra profits for businesses.

Related to the bump offers, ThriveCart also offers one-click upsell, allowing customers to add more products or services to their orders without having to add their card details again.

And if your prospective customers still aren’t buying, ThriveCart offers a downsell option – a special discount to customers who haven’t clicked the ‘buy’ button.

This allows you to eliminate every last possible objection a prospective customer may have and cut your lost sales significantly.

It’s important to say that ThriveCart isn’t for everyone. As we have already mentioned, it isn’t a traditional online shopping basket. It doesn’t work for high volume consumer products, because there is no function for extra information like sizes or colour of clothing. For more typical physical products, it is best to stick with standard ecommerce software like Shopify.

ThriveCart is exceptionally good value for money.

At the time of writing, it is priced at $495 (approximately £392) for lifetime access. There have been rumours for a long time that it will be switching to a monthly payment of $97 per month, but that has yet to happen. If you pay the $495 and you are not happy (very unlikely!), you can get a full refund within 30 days.

Compare ThriveCart’s pricing with closest rival SamCart, which costs $49 per month for its most basic package (although the majority of businesses will opt for its $99 per month option). ClickFunnels has more functionality than ThriveCart (its checkout function is just a part of it), but it costs $99 per month for its basic package and $297 per month for its top of the range package.

Taking into account the pricing, the functionality and ease of use of ThriveCart, it really should be your number one choice for selling services, memberships, B2B, SAAS and high value physical products online.

Top funnel building software resources

Tue, 21 Jul 2020 09:49:52 GMT

If your sales funnel isn’t working quite as well as you would like, it could be that you aren’t using the right software.

And that wouldn’t be your fault. There are so many choices out there, and they won’t all work the way you would like them to work for your business.

Your sales funnel consists of four stages and you need to get each of them right to create a really effective funnel:

Awareness – when someone visits your website for the first time, after a Google search, clicking on an ad or responding to a post on social media

Interest – your business can offer the solution to a visitor’s problem, so they subscribe for your email list and/ or follow you on social media

Decision – a prospective customer is weighing up what you have to offer, before making a final decision about whether to buy

Action – the prospective customer clicks on the purchase button and becomes a customer

We have tested out plenty of software over the years and have learned about what works well and what doesn’t for every stage of the sales funnel. Just as importantly, we know what is easy to use and what isn’t so easy.

So here are our recommendations for some of the best software for every stage of your sales funnel.

Prices and currency conversions are correct at the time of writing.

Awareness: Artwork creation

The top of your sales funnel could be your social media, your ads or even a glossy, printed brochure. To get someone interested in your products or services, you need to attract their attention with a strong brand identity. To create artwork which is consistent across your brand, but without spending a fortune on a designer, you need good artwork creation software.

For this, we would recommend Crello https://crello.com/home and Artboard Studio https://artboard.studio/

Crello

Graphic and video design tool which works in a few clicks
Over 25,000 still and 9,000 video design templates
Design formats especially for Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube
Access to 70 million stock photos
Create easy animations
Great for print – including flyers, business cards, posters and invitations
Priced from free to $7.99 (£6.44) per month

Artboard Studio

Create branding designs and update them across multiple projects
Library of exclusive photos and templates
Easy to use
Easily share projects with team members
Integrate with platforms from Twitter to MailChimp and more without downloading and uploading
Priced $15 (£12) per month for the commercial license, with free access for charities and not-for-profit organisations

Interest: Creating lead magnets

A lead magnet is something extra you can offer through your website, in return for a visitor’s contact information. They include things like ebooks, videos and webinars, and are a really effective way of getting those valuable email addresses. They are a tried-and-tested way of converting more traffic into leads.

Few people can resist something extra for free – it’s called a ‘magnet’ because it attracts people.

So you need to be sure that the lead magnets you are creating really will attract your visitors to sign up. For this, we recommend Google Slides https://www.google.co.uk/slides or Beacon https://beacon.by/

Google Slides

Free to use
Wide variety of easy to use themes, templates and fonts
Available to access from any device at any time
Saves changes automatically as you type
Can be worked on by a whole team

Beacon

Specialised lead magnet solution
Helps you create beautiful lead magnets without a designer
Easy to use
Professional templates which you can customise for your brand
Automatically converts a blogpost into a lead magnet format
Integrates with the most popular email marketing and blogging platforms
Priced from free for beginners up to $99 (£79) per month for the ‘agency’ package

Interest: Email marketing software

Email marketing is an essential part of your sales funnel – whether someone is considering a first purchase or coming back to your site as a regular customer. The potential ROI on email marketing is high – and it’s even higher if you can send the right emails to the right people at the right time, rather than relying on bulk campaigns which won’t appeal to everyone.

For the very best email marketing software, we recommend MailerLite https://www.mailerlite.com

MailerLite

Easy to build professional emails with no designer or HTML skills required
Delivers personalised messages with advanced targeting campaigns
A/B testing to ensure your emails are as effective as possible
Tracks your performance to find out what works best for your business
Offers 24/7 live chat support
Priced from free for up 1,000 subscribers and 12,00 emails per month and $50 (£40) per month for 5,001 to 10,000 subscribers and unlimited emails

Decision: Popups and form embeds

There are two types of popups – really annoying or really effective. Obviously, you want to be using the effective type! Convertbox https://convertbox.com is a step ahead of other software – driving more leads and sales with personalised messages delivered at the right time.

Ready to launch soon, you can request early access and lifetime pricing now.

Convertbox

Easy to edit and customise to match your brand
Choice of on-site messages and notifications in a few clicks
Collects the data you need with custom lead capture forms
Segments your audience to deliver highly personalised offers specific to their interests
Easy to carry out A/B testing to quickly learn what works best for conversions
Embeds your favourite tools to show videos, add checkout software, connect with messenger bots and more

Action: Checkout software

The checkout page is the most important part of the sales funnel, but it is also where up to 40% of potential customers are lost, due to confusing or badly designed pages.

ThriveCart https://thrivecart.com not only improves your basket and checkout to prevent these lost sales, it can actually boost sales by persuading customers to buy more from you at the last minute.

ThriveCart

Easy to set up with no knowledge of coding required
Offers beautiful checkout pages with features that increase the value of every visitor to your site
Includes hard-to-refuse ‘bump’, upsell and downsell offers at checkout
Integrates seamlessly with a large range of software you already use on your site
Good value for money - priced at $495 (£396) for lifetime access

Action: Course software

Offering online courses and training – either paid or free of charge - is relevant to most B2B companies and is a fast-growing business. In fact, online learning is expected to reach $325 (£260) billion by 2025.

Whether you are a web designer offering web training course, an architect helping clients to plan their developments or just someone with a passion for a topic who wants to share their knowledge, the right course software can make it work for you.

For software that doesn’t just create a course, but helps you build your business and brand, we recommend Teachable https://teachable.com

Teachable

Easy to link to your website with a custom domain
Integrates with a huge range of platforms
Offers live one-to-one or groups sessions
Course compliance controls that require completion before moving on
Easy to create sales pages
Range of pricing and payment options
Priced at $99 (£80) per month for the most popular plan

Entire funnel: All-in-one software

Sometimes you don’t need multiple types of software and a variety of different platforms to do the job for you. All-in-one sales funnel software includes multiple functions from courses emailing to taking payments, courses and more.

These tools will help you run an effective sales funnel to optimise conversions without the need for a team of web developers and designers.

The best all-in-one funnel software platforms we’ve come across are Kartra https://home.kartra.com/home and InfluencerSoft https://influencersoft.com

Kartra

Easy to use page builder with a choice of hundreds of templates, which can be integrated into the right part of your funnel
Builds a complete funnel with automations, emails, segmented prospects and more
Keeps track of your leads – from what they have subscribed for to what they have bought and which emails they have opened
Easy to create personalised emails based on your visitors’ behaviour
Recruits, manages and tracks affiliates
Optimised checkout pages suitable for selling both digital and physical products
Priced from $99 (£79) per month, with the most popular package priced at $199 (£159) per month

InfluencerSoft

An entire funnel from strategy to branding, content and automation
Choice of funnel templates for different products and services
Tracks funnel to determine where to make improvements
Automated emails segment subscribers based on their actions
Attractive and responsive payment pages include different payment plans and upsells and downsells
Includes affiliate platform
Priced at $997 (£798) for lifetime access

Google Ads tips to make your campaigns more profitable

Fri, 17 Jul 2020 13:12:41 GMT

Spending money on advertising your products or services to your target audience is always a good idea.

There can be few better places to start than Google Ads (previously known as Google Adwords).

The figures speak for themselves – 246 million unique visitors, 3.5 billion daily interactions and an estimated return on investment of 700%.

But if you want to ensure the best possible return on your advertising budget, you need to know a few hacks to make Google Ads work for you.

Here we will share our very best tips to make your Google Ads campaigns even more profitable.

Longtail keywords

Keywords are essential to setting up and targeting your Google Ads, but don’t always go for the obvious ones. It’s tempting to use keywords with a high search volume, but the traffic they bring won’t always be the quality traffic you need. If your keywords are too broad or too vague, Google will show your ads to the wrong people – meaning fewer clicks and a higher proportional spend for you.

But using longtail keywords – phrases of three to five words – is where you can make the real gains. Longtail keywords have a lower search volume, but will bring a much more targeted audience to your site. These are the people who are specifically looking for what you have to sell. This means they are far more likely to buy, which also means a much lower cost-per-click for you.

Use your competitor’s keywords

Your competitor doesn’t have a monopoly on certain keywords. In fact, you should run ads based on your competitor’s keywords because targeting them can actually give a really good return on your own investment.

If someone is specifically searching for your competitor, that is a very targeted search for a specific product or service. If you are offering something similar and targeting the same keywords, you will come up in the searches too and it is likely that a potential customer will also be interested in your product or service.

Use a tool like Neil Patel’s Ubersuggest to see which keywords your competitors are ranking for and getting traffic for. You can even target your competitor’s brand name as a keyword as an easy way to generate more sales for your own business. Due to trademarking laws, you may not be able to include the brand name in your copy, but targeting it as a keyword can still drive sales for you.

Use exclusions

There are very few products that are designed for everybody, so why advertise to everybody? If you know your products won’t appeal to 18-24s or people with high income – exclude them!

There are lots of different ways to target your ads by excluding categories of people. The more groups of people you exclude, the more focused your ads will be on reaching the right audience for your business. Using exclusions means you are spending your money wisely on people who are more likely to become customers.

Target a lower position in searches

This may seem to go against all of your instincts, but there is sense in not aiming for the top three positions on searches.

Many people aren’t ready to buy on their first search – and that will be when they look at the top three ads which come up on searches. When they come back later, with the intention of going ahead with a purchase, they are ready to research further, which means looking at the ads appearing in fourth, fifth or even lower in the rankings.

At this point, they know exactly what it is they want to buy and are more likely to opt for your product or service. Just as importantly, by avoiding the top spots and these initial searches, you haven’t spent money on clicks which haven’t converted to sales.

Use locations

You can target your Google Ads for different locations. This is especially important if you have a physical shop or if you only deliver to certain areas.

Test the effectiveness of your adverts by using different locations. So you could try ‘Gloucestershire’, ‘Cheltenham’ or ‘South West England’ as different options.

You can target location in your ad campaign either by using a location as a keyword eg ‘Worcestershire’ or by setting a radius - which could be five miles, 100 miles or more from your location, depending on the nature of your business. Or you could even use both.

Test the different ways of setting your location to see which gives you the best return on your investment . By doing this, you will eliminate people who would never have become customers in the first place.

Remarketing

You know when you search for a product or company online and then its ads seem to follow you around the internet for days afterwards? That’s remarketing. A potential customer has already shown an interest in your business or your product, so it makes sense to target them more than a more general audience.

The click-through rate for remarketing is around 10 times higher than it is for more traditional ads and the cost-per-click to you as a business could be anywhere between two and 100 times less.

So set up specific Google Ads campaigns for people who have already visited your site at least once before. They have shown they are interested in your products and services, so a remarketing ad may be all it takes for them to take the next step and buy from you.

Add extensions to your ads

Extensions are a way of supplementing your advert with additional information at no extra cost. This can help with targeting the right people at the right time.

You can add a whole range of extra information to your ads with extensions, including information about specific pages on your site, product details, your phone number or any special offers you have running.

According to Google, adding extensions to your ads can increase click-throughs by 10 to 15%.

Track your performance

It is essential to track the performance of your Google Ads, so you can see what works and what doesn’t.

UTM codes are an easy way of tracking how well your ads are doing. These codes can be added to the end of any URL to track clicks and performance of your marketing activities.

Once you add the UTM code to your campaign’s URL, you can track its performance in Google Analytics. You don’t need to be a developer to create the UTM codes yourself, even someone with limited technical skills can easily create a code for a page in seconds using Google’s URL builder tool.

It is easy to get started with all of these tips.

By implementing them, you should see an increase in customer spend and a proportional reduction in your own spending on Google Ads.

Stats:

https://www.internetlivestats.com/google-search-statistics/

https://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2019/02/07/google-search-statistics

7 Sales Funnel Tips For Small Businesses

Tue, 23 Jun 2020 11:48:34 GMT

Tips to improve your sales funnel

Everyone who sells online needs to create a sales funnel to convert website visitors into paying customers. The sales funnel moves visitors from one stage to the next until they make a purchase.

It is described as a ‘funnel’ because it starts with lots of people – visitors arriving at your site through a Google search, an ad or social media – and ends with a small number of people – customers.

Your sales funnel consists of four stages:

Awareness – when someone visits your website for the first time, following a Google search, after clicking on an ad or responding to a post on social media

Interest – your business can offer the solution to a person’s problem, so they subscribe for your email list and/ or follow you on social media

Decision – a prospective customer is weighing up what you have to offer, before making a final decision about whether to buy

Action – the prospective customer clicks on the purchase button and becomes a customer

The challenge of course is to get as many people as possible to pass through those stages and make it all the way through to the bottom of your sales funnel.

Here we share some tips to improve your sales funnel…

Use intriguing headlines

You want people to engage with your business, and ultimately to buy from you. To do this, you’ve got to get them interested, but don’t tell them everything in your headline. Because why would they click on your link if they’ve got all their answers already?

Make people curious and desperate to find out more. So your headline could tell people what they are NOT going to find out, but they need to click on your link to find out the answers eg "How I made a six-figure profit in a year with this one service… "

In your sub-heading, you can go on to say that it doesn’t require a lot of extra money or time to achieve it.

Who could resist clicking on your call-to-action button after that?

But if your headline said How I made a six-figure profit in a year by improving my SEO and getting more five-star reviews, many potential customers would think they could work that out for themselves without clicking the link to buy the service you are offering.

Make the most of your blog

Your blog is essential to your business, because it can help with both the awareness and interest stages of your sales funnel. For some companies, your blog could be the main source of traffic to your website, so you need to make it count.

Optimise your content with the right keywords, so you can attract customers from organic searches. Sharing your blog content on social media is another way to bring potential customers to your website.

But while very important, your blog can only do so much. It can bring people to your website, but it can’t make them buy. That’s why you need your sales pages to move people onto the decision phase of the sales funnel.

Build your sales page to maximise conversions

It seems obvious, but you need to be sure that you have built and designed your sales pages to maximise conversions. There are three key phases of selling:

Emotion

Logic

Fear

Getting engaged in the story of a business or product is emotion. Whether it is a fourth-generation family business started on a kitchen table, a company using only locally sourced produce or a product with low environmental impact, many people buy through emotion.

Some people will need to think more carefully about what they are buying.

Can they justify the purchase?

These people need logic and your sales pages need to appeal to them. Yes, they want to buy a product with low environmental impact, but can their logical side justify a higher price?

The final stage is fear – or urgency or scarcity. The panic buying in supermarkets at the start of the coronavirus pandemic shows just how many people will buy due to fear. Is a product about to run out? Will the special offer finish in the next hour?

With emotion as the key driver, keep the top third of your landing pages dedicated to emotion. The next third of the page should be dedicated to logical arguments – what are the benefits to the potential customer of buying your product or service? But some people need the final push of urgency and scarcity to encourage them to buy something – and to buy it now.

This technique also works for sales emails – if people on your email list don’t respond to an emotional email, send a logical one. And if there are still people who haven’t responded after a logical email, send them one about your time-limited offer. That way, you tick all the boxes and appeal to all customer types.

Offer a lead magnet to grow your list

A lead magnet is something extra you can offer through your website, in return for a visitor’s contact information. A lead magnet should be something which is hard to refuse, including things like ebooks, videos and webinars, and is a really effective way of getting those valuable email addresses.

By opting for a lead magnet and signing up to your email list, a visitor is at the interest stage of the sales funnel. When they start receiving your emails, they are moving towards decision, as they begin to pay more attention to what you have to offer.

Last minute up-selling

Just as we are tempted to pick up a bar of chocolate or a can of drink at the checkout in the supermarket, we can also tempt customers to buy one last thing when they are making a purchase online.

Last minute up-selling needs to be for an impulse buy which is related to what a customer is already ordering. It should be very obvious what it is – they are in the middle of the buying process and don’t want to read an explanation. It should also be cheaper than the item or service they are already buying. You need to make it very easy to click and buy – related to the ‘fear’ factor in purchasing decisions.

To maximise the potential of your last minute up-selling, your offer should pop up after a customer has input their payment details, but before they’ve hit the final button to confirm their purchase.

Add an offer wall

An offer wall is another up-selling technique. For some customers, once they have bought something they go into a bit of a buying frenzy and want to buy more. They are excited by what they have bought and want to find something similar. This is where you risk them leaving to go to a competitor’s website.

Adding an offer wall will help these hyperactive buyers to stick with you. Once you have thanked them for ordering your product or service, give them some suggestions of other products or services which can enhance what they have already bought from you.

Even though they have already reached the bottom of your sales funnel, taken action and bought something, the process doesn’t need to end there. There is no reason why they shouldn’t buy something else.

Don’t say ‘thank you’ yet

As soon as a customer arrives at a page saying ‘thank you for your order’, they are going to shut the page down and move on. So don’t say ‘thank you’ yet. Offer them one last chance to buy something extra.

Keep the sales funnel open a bit longer with a final ‘your order isn’t complete’ page. If they are buying books, offer them something in the same genre or by the same author. If they are buying jeans, suggest a top or bag to go with them.

Showing customers other items they may be interested in can increase sales dramatically.

Say ‘thank you’ with a webinar

For high-end purchases, particularly in the business-to-business sector, adding a webinar to your thank you pages is an effective way to get customers to come back to your business.

They have bought your product or service, now they want to know how best to use it. A webinar will give them all the information they need to get started and, importantly, it will reinforce the idea that yours is a good company to do business with, which is willing to go the extra mile for customers. The extra gesture provided by the webinar will help them to think of you the next time they want to make a similar purchase.

Whether we realise it or not, all businesses use a sales funnel. Every customer will follow the same process from when they first notice your business to when they go through with a purchase.

The key is to make that journey through the sales funnel more effective by trying to add value to every stage. Whether it’s a few extra sales because of your more effective headlines, or a last minute additional purchase at the checkout stage, it will all boost your bottom line.

Five landing page tips to increase sales

Wed, 17 Jun 2020 17:52:52 GMT

How Can Landing Pages Increase Your Sales?

If you have an ecommerce website, your landing pages have one very important job to do – to get people to buy something.

But do your landing pages always work for you? And, if not, what can you do to improve them?

We’ve collected together five tips which should make a real difference to your landing pages. By using these tips, you will see a measurable growth in your sales.

Testing and optimisation

It stands to reason, but if you want to be sure how well (or not) something is working, you need to test it. You should do this right from the start – when you set up your website. But if you didn’t do a proper job at the start, or you haven’t reviewed it for a while, now is a good time to test your landing pages again.

Many people will tell you that a short landing page works best – not too much information to overwhelm a potential customer and a simple, clear path to checkout. But others will tell you that a longer page works better – that their customers want to get as much information as they can in one place before committing to buy.

Clearly there is no right or wrong answer. Different page lengths work better for different businesses, different industries and different customer bases.

So you need to test what works for your own customers and potential customers. Testing is the only way to be sure what your visitors are looking for, to encourage them to convert. Test a variation at a time – like page length, headline, call to action and image size – so you can back up your ideas with concrete data.

Once you have this information, you can optimise your landing pages in response to your own data. Making changes to your website based on the results of your testing will gradually shift you towards the ‘perfect’ landing pages for your industry, your business and most importantly, your customers.

Dynamic keyword insertion

Dynamic keyword insertion (DKI) is a way of customising the text in your ads, so that they better meet the needs of people searching for products or services like yours.

It is a useful tool for companies which have a lot of products which match the same description. Using DKI to add specific terms to adverts which match searches means visitors will be more likely to buy from you.

For example, if you sell garden furniture, this can appear in a number of different searches. So your ad would include the key term ‘garden furniture’, but if someone was to search for the more specific ‘rattan garden furniture’, the text in your ad will change to read ‘rattan garden furniture’.

The version of the advert a person sees is dependent on the keyword or phrase they searched for initially. If an ad matches their original search eg by reading ‘rattan garden furniture’ rather than just ‘garden furniture’, they would be more likely to make a purchase from you than from a business whose advert just said ‘garden furniture’.

This technique can also help you to reach a local audience, by adding the location to both an ad and your landing page eg ‘Cheltenham’s best garden furniture’. Even when shopping online, many people prefer to buy from smaller, local businesses than from big companies.

Breadcrumb technique

The breadcrumb technique might seem counterintuitive. Because aren’t we always hearing that less is more? That people prefer to do things quickly and move on? The breadcrumb technique does the complete opposite. It means visitors fill in a series of shorter landing forms – and don’t have to give their name and email address straightaway.

Instead, the breadcrumb technique starts with some qualifying questions which will help visitors decide if your business and your product or service is what they were looking for. If your business isn’t right for them, they will leave at this stage, which is fine – because they wouldn’t have converted anyway.

The technique works because visitors find it easier to engage if the questions aren’t asking for their contact details from the start.

Initial questions should seem ‘non-threatening’ and therefore very easy to answer. Having got over this first hurdle, visitors are then more likely to move through your subsequent questions, including giving their contact details.

What might have seemed ‘threatening’ at the outset becomes less threatening because they have already started to engage with you. Starting with a very small ask means they are more likely to say yes as your request grows and becomes a bigger commitment.

Answering an initial question which doesn’t require them to share their contact details is the start of a visitor’s engagement with your business, which many will be willing to see through to the end.

And if it doesn’t work quite as you’d hoped, the breadcrumb technique makes it easier to find out where your visitors are giving up. Whether they are giving up after the first question or just before the last form, you are picking up valuable data. This makes it easier for you to make changes to improve your forms to ensure better engagement and more quality leads in future.

Tracking micro-conversions

Time spent on a page, abandoned baskets or viewed videos are all ‘micro-conversions’. They don’t go as far as actually converting, but they are steps visitors take on their way to make a purchase.

You can track micro-conversions to see what is working and what isn’t. If visitors are clicking away from your landing page quickly, is there a problem with the page? If lots of people are abandoning their baskets, is your checkout process too complicated?

By tracking your micro-conversions, you can pick up any potential problem areas and then work to improve them. Go back to your testing and optimisation to find out what works and what doesn’t for the audience you are trying to reach. Ultimately, this will make your landing pages more effective and increase your sales.

Use Live Chat

Live Chat is becoming increasingly common on websites. And for good reason – because it works!

Without Live Chat, if a visitor gets confused on your landing page, they may spend time on your site looking for answers eg delivery costs or your returns policy. However, the likelihood is that they will simply leave your site and go and look for their answers, and a similar product to meet their needs, elsewhere.

But Live Chat means you can answer any queries and guide a customer through the sales process in real time . It is especially useful if you are selling complex, unique or high-end products. If people are going to be spending a lot of money, they want to be sure that they are getting the right product or service before they commit to buy. But they don’t necessarily want to step away from your website to look up additional information, send an email or make a phone call to get the information they need.

Being able to chat anonymously can feel less stressful for visitors than a phone call or email conversation. In fact, research shows that many consumers prefer Live Chat to email, phone or social media as a way of getting in touch with a business. Most people find it easy to use and are satisfied that it gives them the answers they are looking for.

Getting immediate answers to their queries helps to build confidence in your brand – and shows that you care about customers and are ready and willing to help them.

Using these five tips for the landing pages on your ecommerce site can help you to increase sales and build up customer loyalty.

But as every business and every customer base is different, they may not all work for you.

The key is to keep following the tips, keep testing and keep optimising until you have a website and landing pages which work for the audience you are trying to reach.

How to Increase Sales Using LinkedIn

Thu, 28 May 2020 09:48:27 GMT

If you think LinkedIn is just somewhere to search for a new job or new employees, you are missing a trick. With over 500 million members in 200 countries and geared specifically towards professionals, it is also a way of linking you with a huge number of potential customers who could be looking for your brand . Used effectively, LinkedIn can help you grow your sales.

But how do you do that?

Here’s our top tips for increasing your sales using LinkedIn…

A really good profile

Your profile is the first thing a visitor to LinkedIn will see. And they will decide within seconds of looking at it whether they want to connect and do business with you.

Your photo should look both professional and friendly and your profile summary should be clear. You’ve got 2000 characters to really sell yourself and your business. You should add some personality, tell your career story and inspire action from your connections. Make sure you make it work!

Connect, connect, connect

You should send up to 150 personalised connection requests every day to your target audience to build your network. Connection requests should always include a short message to introduce yourself.

Start with people you know, colleagues and former colleagues. Then use the search page to find people in related industries or your local area, who you could potentially do business with.

The Grow Your Network page will help you connect with people already in your email address book

The My Network page will display pending invitations from people wanting to connect with you

The People You May Know feature will suggest other people you may want to connect with

Not only is every connection, known as 1st degree connections, a potential customer, they are also a way to meet other potential connections – 2nd degree connections (people who are connected to your connections).

You should aim for more than 500 connections in total. Having over 500 connections means you will appear in more searches. LinkedIn will just show you as having 500+ connections – so it doesn’t matter if you have 501 or 4000, you will appear the same to connections and potential connections. If you have less than 500 connections – LinkedIn will show your connections as the exact number. If that number is low, people are less likely to see you as a valuable person to connect with.

Follow up

Once someone has accepted your connection request, send them a quick message to thank them for accepting your invitation. You should also give a brief introduction to yourself, without getting into sales talk.

This introduction will help your connection feel that they are getting to know you, which will mean in turn that they are more likely to do business with you in future.

Don’t be afraid to get in touch again at a later date if you feel you can offer something of value to your connection eg if you have seen a post from them on a particular subject that you can help with. But make sure your messages can’t be seen as spam. LinkedIn is about building a professional relationship, so don’t be tempted to send sales information or anything which could be viewed as irrelevant.

Keep publishing posts

Having grown your LinkedIn network, you want to keep your connections interested in you, your brand and what you have to say. So it is important to publish posts regularly to earn their trust, with a view to connections ultimately becoming customers.

Make your posts a mix of your own original articles – either written specifically for LinkedIn or new posts from your blog (include a link back to your website), articles from other businesses or business leaders, and news articles. You can also include relevant reports, presentations or videos. Having a variety of types of post is more attractive to LinkedIn followers than just relying on one sort of post.

Have a look at other posts which are popular and receive lots of shares and engagement. Try to share something similar, without actually copying them.

But beware of posting for the sake of posting. If you share everything that pops into your mind, you risk your valuable posts getting lost in your own ‘noise’.

You should aim to post between twice a week and once a day – on weekdays only. There is no advantage to posting more than once a day.

Make sure you engage with your audience when they comment on your posts – and take time to comment on your connections’ posts too. As ever, it’s important to keep your comments relevant to ensure they add value – just saying ‘Great post’ is less relevant than saying nothing at all.

Use LinkedIn Groups

LinkedIn Groups are a place for professionals either in the same industry or with similar interests to interact, ask for advice, share experiences and build valuable connections. There are groups on LinkedIn covering a whole range of industries.

You can search and request to join particular groups. Group managers may ask for additional information to make sure you meet their criteria. This means you can feel confident about the quality of a particular group.

Make sure you are active in a group and that you ask and answer questions, as well as providing the group with any relevant updates. Again, it is important to steer clear of offering information which is blatantly sales-related. Instead, by showing yourself to be a helpful and supportive group member, you will see sales rise organically.

Export your data

You can download all of your data from LinkedIn, including everything from details of your connections to how you interact with ads, who has endorsed you and the results of search queries.

Although downloading the data can be time consuming, it is useful so that you have a back-up in case there is a problem with your account.

Most importantly, downloading data also means you can share information with colleagues, who can make contact with your connections and help you grow your business. (Although LinkedIn’s most recent privacy update does mean that not everyone gives permission for contacts to download their email addresses.)

Use Facebook

Facebook ads are incredibly cost-effective, and Facebook is the world’s number one social media site, with 1.73 billion users accessing it every day worldwide in 2020. There are nearly 45 million Facebook users in the UK alone.

So exporting your LinkedIn connections and retargeting them on Facebook can really drive leads and engagement for your business.

When you have your connections’ email addresses from exporting your LinkedIn data, you can upload them to Facebook as a custom audience. Then you can start running ads, including video ads, for your new custom audience. You should give your audience the option to connect to your website with a ‘Find out more’ button.

If you are already sharing interesting and engaging content on LinkedIn, your connections will trust you to do the same on Facebook. In this way, Facebook has the potential to become a really valuable element of your marketing.

Keep going!

Using LinkedIn as a way of increasing sales might seem like a lot of work initially, but once you’ve put that work in, it will become less time-consuming.

Make sure you keep up the momentum of publishing posts, engaging in groups and building your connections over time. Sticking with LinkedIn in the long-term will help you get to know your connections and build trust with them, which will ultimately help you boost your sales.

Increasing sales through LinkedIn won’t happen overnight.

It is a long-term strategy, but if you put the effort in, it is a way of connecting with the right people and building relationships - with the aim of these people becoming regular customers and supporters of your brand.

Why your business needs to offer lead magnets

Wed, 20 May 2020 09:22:36 GMT

A lead magnet is a unique piece of content you offer to visitors to your website in return for their contact details.

Few people can resist something extra for free – it’s called a ‘magnet’ because it attracts people.

We’ve written more here about some of the different types of lead magnets you could offer, but it could be anything from an ebook to bonus video content or a downloadable checklist.

Whatever form they take, lead magnets usually have two things in common. The first is that you will need to put a bit of time or effort into producing them (even if that’s just repackaging an existing blogpost), so that visitors know they are getting something unique.

People are unlikely to give you their email address if they can find the content elsewhere without giving you their contact details.

The second is that lead magnets go beyond simply selling your products and services – they are about giving visitors useful information, whether or not they go on to buy from you.

From the point of view of your readers, a lead magnet is added value with no strings attached. What’s not to love?

Why you need lead magnets

When you consider your content strategy, including your blog and social media, you should also think about lead magnets. Because lead magnets can make a really valuable contribution to your conversions.

Lead magnets drive conversions, full stop. The whole point is to get contact details from website visitors, so that they go from unknown visitors to known leads and potential customers.

By signing up for a lead magnet, a person is showing that they are interested in what you have to say and want to find out more. If your lead magnets are of interest to your audience, they can help turn leads into regular customers who are loyal to your brand.

If you are knowledgeable about a particular subject, a lead magnet - whether an ebook, video or something else - allows you to go into the subject in more depth. Every blogpost you write should contribute something – whether that is answering questions from customers or commenting on issues in your industry or the news agenda.

But a lead magnet goes much further than a blogpost can. It isn’t restricted to 1000 words and allows you to share more of your expertise, giving something valuable to your readers, which they can’t get anywhere else.

How lead magnets encourage conversion

Just signing up for a lead magnet is the first step towards conversion – converting readers into leads and ultimately into paying customers. But it goes further and helps put you at the front of a potential customer’s mind.

When people start researching a subject or looking for a particular product online, they will usually search a phrase, then open a number of sites, have a quick read through, and shut them down again. They might be learning something, but they aren’t building a connection with a particular site or brand.

But when you send them a lead magnet, you are sending them something which meets their needs and answers more of their questions in an easily digestible format. This will make your business more memorable. It becomes the one they build a connection with – and the one they are most likely to buy from.

As a business, the most important benefit of a lead magnet is that you get valuable contact information. The aim is always to get a person’s primary email address. Many people will have multiple email addresses, some of which they don’t use. But if they want to receive something from you, they are far more likely to give you their main email address.

While some companies advise offering a lead magnet as a download immediately in return for an email address, we would advise you being a bit cleverer than that. Make sure you actually email out a link containing the lead magnet, rather than offering it immediately. That way, visitors will have to give you a genuine email address, in return for the lead magnet.

Make it work

To get that valuable contact information, you need people to want your lead magnet. The whole point of a lead magnet is not to give too much away initially, but you have to reveal enough detail to make it something people will actually want. So whether it is an ebook, a checklist or a piece of video, you need to write a title that will get people excited.

People have short attention spans and that goes for titles too. Apparently they only really notice the first three and last three words in a title – so those need to be the most important ones.

This isn’t the place for puns or clever headlines, just tell them exactly what your lead magnet is about eg 15 LinkedIn secrets that will work for you or 10 top SEO tips for small businesses.

Alternatively, use How to in the title. This makes it clear exactly what problem you are going to solve eg How to get your garden ready for summer and promises useful information that the reader will be able to use straightaway.

If you are confident that your lead magnet has all the answers anyone could possibly need, make a bold claim in your headline using The ultimate guide eg The Ultimate guide to keyword research for SEO.

Spread the word

Although you don’t want people to share your lead magnets in the same way they would your blog links (because then people could get them ‘free’ without giving you their email address) – you can still encourage your leads to spread the word.

Once a visitor has given you their contact details for the lead magnet, they should be redirected to a page thanking them for their information. This is a great place to suggest they share something on social media eg ‘ I’ve just downloaded Tewkesbury Garden Centre’s ebook Making the most of your garden all year round, click here to find out more ’. Include social media sharing icons eg Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, and a link to your landing page, so that their followers have the opportunity to sign up for the lead magnet too.

You can also add another opportunity to share to social media after reading or viewing, with a call to action like: ‘ If you think this ebook would be useful to others, we would love you to share it with your followers ’. Again, include a link to the landing page and social media sharing icons.

Alternatively, you can encourage people to share your lead magnets directly on social media , but using the Link Lock tool. Anyone who clicks on the link in social media will be able to see an impression of the lead magnet, below the Link Lock opt-in tool, but will need to give their email address before they are actually able to unlock and read or view it.

Creating lead magnets takes a little bit of time, but the potential gains are well worth the additional effort.

By putting that extra work in and creating something of value to your audience, you will be able to increase your email contact list to help keep building your business.

10 Tried and Tested Lead Magnet Ideas

Tue, 12 May 2020 13:21:48 GMT

A lead magnet is something extra you can offer through your website, in return for a visitor’s contact information.

They include things like ebooks, videos and webinars, and are a really effective way of getting those valuable email addresses. But lead magnets can take a lot of time and energy to produce.

However, to save time, every blogpost in your archive has the potential to be updated and repurposed as a lead magnet to bring more leads to your website.

Before we give you some easy lead magnet ideas, we wanted to quickly run through the conversion path that will turn website visitors into leads , and the importance of email marketing in that process:

Call to action (CTA)

This is the essential button you need for blog readers and website visitors to click, so that they can access your lead magnet.

Landing page

This is where a visitor ends up after clicking on your CTA. Here they will fill in their name, email address and any other relevant contact information.

Thank you page

The visitor will then go to a page thanking them for their information.

Email the resource

As long as the visitor has given you a genuine email address, you will now be able to send them the lead magnet. This email should also be where you start a conversation with the lead, to keep them engaged with your business in the future.

Here we share 10 tried and tested lead magnet ideas that you can easily create by repurposing your existing content.

1. The mini ebook

The best lead magnets offer an attractive and instant reward to visitors, and the mini ebook definitely ticks that box.

A mini ebook is the perfect lead magnet for when you have a series of blogposts on a related subject. For example, if you sell garden furniture, you could pick the following posts from your blog to pull together into an ebook:

Get your garden ready for summer

Easy garden design tips for small gardens

Outdoor lighting ideas for your garden

How to make the best of your patio

Outdoor entertaining in your garden

These posts could be pulled together into a mini ebook called Making the most of your garden all year round.

An ebook like this is useful to your visitors because you are making their lives easier. Rather than searching through your website to find one relevant garden article at a time, you are pulling it together into a convenient package, which is easy for them to keep and refer back to.

2. The checklist

If you’ve got instructional posts on your blog, they should be easy to turn into checklists, which can be very useful tools for your visitors. Something like the process for planning an event would work well as a checklist.

Go back to your blogpost and simplify it into a series of bullet points, making sure you remove any points which aren’t actionable. Break it down further into several numbered steps – in the event planning example you can break it down by date from ‘two months before’ to ‘on the day’. Each of these steps should have a list of smaller actions below them, to make the end result more achievable.

To make your checklist even more useful, offer it in printable form, so that people can go through and physically tick off the actions when they’ve achieved them . Ticking an action off a checklist always feels like a great achievement, which people will come to associate with your business.

3. Resource guide

If there is already a lot of useful content available across your industry, it may be difficult to come up with an original take on it. In this case, a resource guide (or ultimate guide) is a useful lead magnet. A resource guide differs from an ebook in that it is a round-up of others’ content, rather than a round-up of your own content.

If other people have already covered a subject in great detail, you can add value by bringing the very best content together into a resource guide. A resource guide, or ultimate guide, is a collection of the best articles on a subject from across the web. It could also include the best apps, videos, or even the best books, on a topic.

When pulling together a resource guide, it is important not to copy content directly into your own article. Instead, you should link back to the original articles, with your own intros for each of them, so that your readers know why the content will be useful for them to read.

4. The workbook

A workbook is a really effective lead magnet, especially for businesses in the service sector. The very best workbooks can be used again and again.

In its most basic form, a workbook is a resource to complete with simple steps to achieve a particular end. Just seeing the steps written out in this format will help people to focus their minds on completing the task.

Internet marketing guru, Neil Patel, has a simple but effective workbook on his site for writing quality blogposts which will rank on Google.

Participants should follow a series of easy exercises as they go through the workbook, with the answers combining to form a finished piece of work. The final piece should add some value for their business – such as a finished blogpost in Neil Patel’s example.

Keep design to a minimum, and leave plenty of space in your workbook. People should be able to print it off and physically fill in the gaps on paper, as they focus their thoughts and learn by doing.

Include a call-to-action with your workbook, letting people know that you can help them apply their new knowledge, using your products or services.

5. Video

Video is one of the most effective ways of learning, and many people would rather watch a video than read copy – particularly for a ‘How to’ video for things like DIY, craft, car maintenance or baking.

So don’t offer all your videos too freely! Offer bonus content – either something completely new or a longer version of one of your existing videos – as a lead magnet, in return for an email address.

6. Bonus Pack

The bonus pack is a very similar principle to holding back some of your video. In this case, you are offering some extra, bonus material to a blogpost, as a way to reward readers who sign up for a lead magnet. In your article Easy garden design tips for small gardens you could offer an additional five exclusive tips or links that weren’t in the original post.

In addition, offering the tips as an exclusive downloadable PDF could make it more attractive to readers when they are shopping for their garden design essentials, or starting work out in the garden.

If your bonus pack offers money-making ideas, the number of people willing to give you their email addresses is likely to increase even further.

7. Case Studies

Case studies focus on an individual real person (or organisation), who has had their life changed or improved by using your product or service. What they have to say can prompt a potential customer to follow in their footsteps and take action.

If you already have a blogpost or video or audio clip which includes an interview with a customer, you can expand on this to create a full case study. Your case study should include relevant and relatable detail about the person, which should in turn make them relatable to your audience. The case study should continue with detail of the issue they needed to resolve and how your product or service helped resolve it for them. Finally, you should share details of their success – whether that is increasing sales by 50%, having a lawn free of weeds or having the confidence to go out again following a difficult time in their lives.

You will need to get approval from the subject of your case study for the information you are sharing, the way it is worded and any photos you use. Once you have this, it makes the perfect lead magnet to show your readers how your products or services can really make a difference.

8. The secret

Few of us can resist finding out something other people don’t know about, which is what makes the secret such an intriguing lead magnet.

The secret should be something a lot of people will find useful or interesting – and you need to sell it in a way that they can’t resist filling in their email contact details.

So if you’ve persuaded a big brand to make a change in their behaviour or even to stock your product, that sounds like just the sort of secret many people would be interested in. Write a blogpost setting the scene about your aims and the work you put in, but keep the final action as a secret eg:

Want to know how I persuaded Tesco to cut down on plastic packaging? Click here to find out.

The secret that you email out to people doesn’t need to include fancy design. They are just interested in getting straight to the point and the secret is all that matters.

Do you have anything you could offer as a lead magnet secret?

9. The Cheat Sheet

If you’ve written a blogpost about something which is useful and a lot of people could learn from, but it is also quite complicated, you could offer a cheat sheet as a lead magnet.

A cheat sheet is a one page summary of your most important points, which is easy to check back on when someone is going through a new process and needs to refresh their memory.

Whatever your industry, there is almost certainly a cheat sheet you could offer – from shutter speed in photography to stretches for marathon runners or shortcuts in Wordpress – you can create your own useful download-and-keep resource to make life easier for your readers.

10. The Webinar

A webinar is a live online talk. If you’ve written an informative blogpost, perhaps about something like new legislation, a webinar is the perfect opportunity to go into more depth. You can offer the webinar as a lead magnet in return for an email address.

Your webinar doesn’t have to involve multiple presenters. A webinar is essentially a chat between yourself and a colleague about the key points, using a live video conferencing platform. Use PowerPoint or similar to create helpful visuals to reinforce the points you are making and ensure everyone watching is getting more information than they would get from a blogpost alone.

Make sure you let people know the date and time of the webinar when they sign up, and consider running it again if the initial session doesn’t attract a very big audience.

People listening in should be able to submit questions, so you can be sure you are covering the points your audience is really interested in. Go back and follow up with these audience members after the webinar, as they are likely to be the most interested in your business, products or services.

With just a little effort, you should be able to convert your existing content into these useful lead magnets, which offer additional value to your audience and, most importantly, give you the contact details you need to keep building your business.

Fast ranking steps for small businesses

Tue, 12 May 2020 11:22:08 GMT

Think it’s only big businesses which can rank on Google? Think again!

Photo by Joshua Rodriguez on Unsplash

There are many ways in which small and medium sized business can rank highly on Google and other search engines. You just need to know what they are.

Internet marketing guru Neil Patel has some great suggestions, which we have summarised here.

Read on for some top tips on how to rank on search engines as a small business…

Find the keywords big brands don’t want

As a small business, you will never rank for very popular keywords, so it makes sense to target keywords which don’t interest the big brands. The best ones to target are ‘longtail keywords’ – phrases of three, four or five words.

They will drive less traffic, but when someone types that combination of words into a search engine, you are far more likely to rank because fewer companies will be targeting them.

And because the keyphrase is so specific, visitors who come to your site from a longer query are far more likely to convert – whether that is buy something, download something or sign up for your regular email newsletter.

Update content with alternative keywords

The more keywords you target, the more potential traffic you can get. When you know which keywords you rank for, you should put those keywords into Neil Patel’s Ubersuggest tool, which will show you longtail variations of the keywords.

So for a dance school writing an informative post about ‘Grade 2 ballet’, Ubersuggest recommends longtail keywords including ‘Grade 2 ballet music’, ‘Grade 2 ballet age’ and ‘Grade 2 ballet character dance’. By integrating these longtail keywords into a web page which already ranks for ‘Grade 2 ballet’, the post will quickly start ranking for the longtail terms too.

Sometimes you can just add the keywords into a post, but generally you will need to take the time to adjust and expand your content to make sure it flows properly.

Photo by Priscilla Du Preez on Unsplash

Local SEO

If you are a local business, SEO is much easier than if you’re targeting large national or international audiences. Google can easily identify when someone is searching for a nearby company.

Start by claiming your business on the Google My Business listing and make the most of it with great photos. You should also claim your business on other sites where people get their information, like TripAdvisor, Facebook and Yelp.

On your own website, include your full address and a map, so that visitors can find your shop or office. Add your phone number, which should be a landline with a recognisable local dialling coded (like 01242 for Cheltenham or 01452 for Gloucester), and make sure someone can click on the number direct and call from their mobile.

Always include customer reviews and testimonials on your site, which are especially important for a local business.

Focus on video

YouTube isn’t just somewhere to catch up on the latest hilarious viral video, it is actually the second biggest search engine after Google. And, most importantly, people get and retain a lot more information from video than they do from reading alone.

‘How to’ videos for everything from car repairs to garden tips or starting a blog are always popular. Make the most of this, by using short, relevant and useful YouTube videos which will direct traffic to key pages on your website.

Create infographics

An infographic is a visual representation of some interesting data. More people prefer getting their information in this way than by reading text, particularly if the text is complicated or contains a lot of numbers.

You can create your own infographic by going to Neil Patel’s Ubersuggest tool and typing in a keyword related to your own website or business. This will bring up popular blogs, based on social shares and backlinks. Look at these and find a blog containing interesting data or a lot of numbers, which would work well visually. Take this data to create your own infographic, using a design tool like Canva.

Once you have your infographic, put it on your website and make sure you share it on social media and with your subscribers. Make sure you also go back to Ubersuggest and the original article where you got your information from, and find everyone who linked to it. You can then send each of them an email with the link to your infographic. From there, it should generate more social shares and more backlinks, as people link back to it from their own sites.

Hire a content writer

Just because you own a business and a website, it doesn’t make you a good writer. As Google typically ranks sites with in-depth content more highly, hire a ghost writer (either a freelancer or a member of staff), who has the time and the skills to write good quality content.

Work with your writer to come up with titles, content ideas and keywords. Ubersuggest will give you an idea of which keywords do well, based on search traffic, social share and backlinks. Once you have a plan for your content writer, leave them to write blogposts and articles, while you focus on other aspects of the business.

Photo by Green Chameleon on Unsplash

Check out your competitors’ pages

If you’ve got a small business and a small website which you want to grow, you need to know what the competition is doing. Before you write any content for your own website, you can check out your competitors on Ubersuggest. When you enter their URLs, Ubersuggest will bring up all of their top pages and the keywords they rank for.

Then take a look at their popular pages and create more in-depth versions of them. If you already have similar posts on your site, update them. Make your post the definitive version of whatever your competitors are offering, so visitors only need to look at your site to get all the information they need.

Check for recent backlinks

Don’t just check your competitors’ pages once and forget them. Keep checking them regularly on Ubersuggest and look for recent backlinks.

If somebody linked to your competitor last week, they could be open to linking to your website today, so get in touch with them. They are far more likely to link to you than someone who wrote about a topic five years ago and hasn’t updated their post since.

Photo by Roman Kraft on Unsplash

Create a round-up post

We all want to get our information quickly and easily, so make it easy for visitors to your website. Go to Ubersuggest and type in a relevant keyword, such as ‘garden design’. Ubersuggest will then bring up all the popular articles on garden design.

You can then bring all of those articles together into a useful round-up post, such as 20 garden design resources you need in 2020 or 20 garden design resources for a small garden. With each of the 20 posts, add a few lines describing the content, and add the link, so your readers can get the information they need.

Once your article is live, go back to Ubersuggest and email everyone who has already linked to those original articles. Ask them to link to your post too – or to share it on their social media or email newsletters – and watch the traffic increase to your site.

Spend time promoting your content

You (or your ghost writer) has put time and effort into researching and writing a post and sourcing the perfect images. But the work doesn’t stop there. Now you need to spend time promoting it. You should spend as much time as you’ve spent creating the content on promoting it – or even more if you can spare the time.

As well as sharing it on your own social channels, contact anyone you’ve linked to in your article and ask them to share it too. You can also go back to your competitors’ posts using Ubersuggest and find out who linked to them. Then email those people telling them about your new article, and the additional points you make that the competition didn’t cover.

You can also find out who has shared your competitors’ articles on Twitter, by going to search.twitter.com and pasting your competitor’s URL into the search box. This will show every account which shared your competitor’s article. You can then tweet or direct message (DM) them and ask them to share your article too, which will increase your social shares further.

Photo by Priscilla Du Preez on Unsplash

Nurture your community

If someone leaves a comment or question on your blog, Facebook, Twitter or YouTube, respond to it! By doing this, you are creating and nurturing a community and building loyalty. By nurturing your community, you are more likely to get social shares and backlinks, because people like to work with real people and good people.

If you come across as a good person on social media, the people in your community will be more likely to search for your brand online. The more searches you get in Google, the higher you will rank and ultimately, the more visitors will go to your website and potentially buy your products or services in the future.

Check the speed of your site

You can have a great website full of interesting content, but if it loads slowly or isn’t mobile compatible, it won’t rank in search engines.

Site speed is part of Google’s algorithm, so you want to be sure that your website loads as quickly as possible on all devices. Use Google PageSpeed to check how fast your site loads. If it’s too slow, delete any unnecessary plugins, reduce the size of pictures, enable caching and make sure you are using a reliable web host.

Photo by Domenico Loia on Unsplash

Link to your own content

When you write something new on your website, it’s probably not the very first time you have touched on the subject. If your site is about interior design and you’re writing something new on curtains, you should always link back to other relevant posts and pages on your site about curtains.

By interconnecting your pages, they will rank higher in searches.

Don’t forget the user

When you write new content, you are writing for SEO, but if you don’t also remember the audience you are writing for, they may never get to see your content.

Google can track user behaviour. So if someone arrives on your site through a Google search, only to click away a second later, it can see that your website isn’t relevant. If this happens too often, your website will slip down the rankings.

So when you write something new, remember the audience you are writing for and make sure you grab them and engage them from the start , so they don’t hit the back button and navigate away.

Photo by Priscilla Du Preez on Unsplash

Don’t use dates in your URL

When you post something new, you will probably put the date in the URL, or some sites will automatically generate a URL for you containing the date. This means that Google thinks a particular piece of content is only relevant to that date. So you may have written something in 2014 which is still relevant today, but that 2014 in your URL is going to be a big deterrent to your post ranking in searches.

Neil Patel found that removing dates from his URLs increased his search traffic by 58%. Obviously it’s not as easy to do if you have got backlinks from lots of different websites and have already linked to your own content, but it is something to focus on moving forward.

While it isn’t easy to rank on Google and other search engines as a new or small business, it isn’t impossible either.

As these tips show, with a bit of time and effort you can really make a difference and get your business ranking.

Tips to bring more business to your website with LinkedIn

Wed, 06 May 2020 09:55:00 GMT

What do you use LinkedIn for?

It’s great for searching for new employees or for finding yourself a new job. But if that’s all you’re using it for, you are not getting the full potential and value out of LinkedIn.

LinkedIn is unique in that it is both somewhere for conducting business and a social media site. So it’s a great place to promote yourself, find relevant business groups and meet new people, who could become future clients or contacts.

To build your customer base and increase sales of your products and services, you need to bring more traffic to your business website. LinkedIn is a great tool for bringing the right people to your website, but it is important to hook them straightaway with a LinkedIn profile they can’t ignore.

So how do you bring in more potential customers using LinkedIn?

Check out our top tips below!

Write a brilliant profile summary - make an impression.

Your LinkedIn profile summary is one of the first things people see when they visit your profile, so it’s important to make it work for you. Some people choose not to write a summary at all on their LinkedIn profile, but they’re missing a trick.

Your profile summary creates your first impression and is the easiest way to set you apart from other LinkedIn users. There are 2,000 characters available to strengthen your profile, add some personality, tell your career story and inspire action from your connections.

Get the keywords right in your summary

LinkedIn’s search algorithms use keywords in your profile to match you with searches, so it’s important to get them right.

Make sure you’re using the best keywords by searching other businesses like your own.

Which keywords do they use? Then search for your own company as if you were a potential client. Which keywords do you use in your search? Those are the keywords which need to be in your summary.

But don’t go too far and cram your summary full of keywords right from the start. Choose the ones which seem to work best and you can adjust them over time to make your summary more precise. The most important thing is to always be thinking of keywords when you write and update your summary, and that you are always aware of new ones which will bring you the most traffic.

Make your first sentences count

First impressions matter and that is especially important for LinkedIn, which will only show the first two or three sentences of your summary to visitors. You have just a few lines available to help visitors decide whether they want to click and find out more, so those first sentences really need to count.

In those sentences you need to be engaging, pull people in and you need to motivate them to take action.

With limited space available, practise writing directly and without additional, unnecessary words. For example, ‘We would be happy to hear from you’ can be expressed as ‘Give us a call’. This cuts down on words, speaks more directly and is less conditional. By cutting out a few words, you have more space for keywords, which are more effective in matching your business with searches.

Make the most of your word count

Your LinkedIn profile summary has a limit of 2000 characters (letters, spaces and punctuation), which should give you about 300-350 words. It’s important to use this as effectively as possible and make sure you use every last word that you can.

The more words you include, the more keywords you can add!

But using up all of your word count doesn’t mean padding your summary out. On the contrary, it means being strict and cutting out unnecessary words so you can keep it clear and direct.

Connect, connect, connect!

LinkedIn isn’t Facebook. It isn’t just about friends and people you know in real life, it’s about connections. While real life friends and colleagues may be a good place to start, you need to connect far more widely to make a difference for your business.

When you are doing your keyword search, send an invitation to connect to everyone who comes up in your searches.

The more connections you have, the bigger audience you have for your posts.

More connections also mean you will appear in more search results, as a suggestion for people with common interests or friends. Whether you have a common interest, you are in the same industry or you are based in the same town, all of these people are useful connections. They may go on to become clients, or they may be the link you need to connect with potential clients you otherwise wouldn’t have come across.

Don’t forget to post

As a social network, LinkedIn isn’t just about setting up your profile, making connections and leaving it there. While your summary will help people to find you, being active and engaging is what keeps them interested.

To make the most of LinkedIn, you need to regularly update your status by sharing interesting posts. This could be something from your own business, something from the wider industry or a news article you think your connections would find interesting. If you are sharing content from another site, it is a good idea to add your thoughts, comments or questions as an introduction, so your connections know why you are sharing the article.

If your post is something you have written yourself, don’t forget to include a link back to your own website at the end.

Like, comment and engage

Just like you, people are posting on LinkedIn to further their career and boost their business. Everyone will appreciate a positive comment and it will make them likely to check out your profile too.

But, more importantly, LinkedIn rewards people who post engaging content and comments. This means that your profile becomes more visible in searches.

You can give a simple like (a thumbs up, just the same as Facebook) to a post, but to improve your profile’s visibility, you need to leave meaningful comments. These will get you noticed by their author and their connections. Don’t forget to be professional, relevant and polite, and to double check your spelling and grammar. Comments aren’t the place for blatant self-promotion. If the author or their connections want to find out more about you, they can check your profile.

Use hashtags

Just like Twitter and Instagram, LinkedIn uses hashtags. When you post a status update on on LinkedIn, make sure you use relevant hashtags, especially for your keywords. This means your posts will come up in hashtag searches. When a visitor clicks an identical hashtag in someone else’s post, they will see your post alongside others with the same hashtag.

Hashtags can either be integrated in the post eg ‘ Check out my new article about #InstagramHashtags and let me know what you think ’ or they can be added at the end of a post.

Avoid using hashtags that are too general – like #article or #marketing. Too many irrelevant hashtags can come across as annoying and can create a negative impression of your business.

If used correctly, LinkedIn hashtags have the potential to grow your LinkedIn connections and ultimately bring more business to your website.

By putting a bit of time and effort into LinkedIn, you can really improve your engagement with the right people, to build your customer base.

Choosing the Right Social Media

Mon, 27 Apr 2020 11:00:26 GMT

“It is better to do one thing well than ten things poorly”
- Heather Hart

If you are starting a business or want to create an online presence for your existing business it can be overwhelming at first to know where to start.

Why is social media important for my business?

In January 2020 there were 3.80 billion people on social media worldwide -

that’s a lot of potential customers!

More people are likely to follow a brand on an app such as Instagram than they are to follow a celebrity. So if you’re not on social media then you could potentially be missing out on a simple, inexpensive and effective way to connect with your audience.

How do I know what social media platform is right for me?

The key to finding out which social media platform is going to work for you is understanding the demographics.

As you would with any marketing campaign, you want to know who uses your products and services. Therefore, knowing who’s on what platform will help you in deciding where your business will thrive.

Are You on YouTube ?

YouTube tops the charts for the most popular platforms with 1,300,000,000 users and 30 million views per day.

80% of views are from outside the US.

In an average month, 8 out of 10 18-49 year-olds watch YouTube videos.

A quick look at Facebook

Facebook is still one of the most popular platforms with 180 million US and 37 million UK adults online.

84% of 25–30 year olds use the platform

The lowest demographic is the over 65s (46%)

Insights of Instagram

Instagram is one of the most popular platforms due to its image sharing, story and live capabilities. There are over 24million users in the UK.

The most popular age bracket for Instagram is the 13-30 year olds. With 72% of 13-17 year olds and 57% of 25-30 year olds using the app.

If your target audience is the over 65s then this is not the app to use as only 8% are on it.

Looking into Linkedin

Linkedin is the place to be for professionals but has a smaller daily usage than most other platforms. For example, many people will check Instagram multiple times a day but only 9% of US users check Linkedin more than once.

30-49 year olds are the most popular age bracket with 37% of users on the platform

18-24 year olds and the over 65s are the least active on Linkedin.

Want to find out more about how to succeed on Linkedin? Head to our blog Tips to bring more business to your website on Linkedin !

Talking about Twitter

Compared to other platforms Twitter usage is lower but still has over 16.7 million users in the UK.

Twitter is ideal for timely content like news and customer service.

38% of users are in the 18-29 age bracket closely followed by the 13-17 year olds at 32%.

Picking Apart Pinterest

With a visual-first focus , this platform is ideal for highlighting products and sharing inspirational or aspirational content.

There are around 332 million international users on the platform.

38% of 18-24 year olds top the user charts with the 30-49 year olds being a close second (35%).

Snapchat

Snapchat is the place to go if your company appeals to younger audiences and can create short video content.

There are over 210 million users that are active on the app daily.

69% of 13-17 year olds use the app and 41% of teens deem it to be the most important social network.

Shouldn’t I try to reach as many people as I can by being on all of the social media platforms?

The short answer? No.

Unless you’re creating content that appeals to all ages you are best to focus on one or two platforms that will serve your demographic. It’s better to create targeted content that will encourage your followers to engage with your brand in order to increase your online presence and encourage sales.

If you spread yourself too thin you’re less likely to fulfil your social media potential and spend most of your time trying to post relevant content on multiple platforms.

Our Top Tips

Take a few minutes to look into the type of customers you have already, ages, locations etc. This will help you to understand your current demographic and who your service or product appeals to.

Use our quick guide above to decide which platforms are most popular with your demographic.

Look at brands and companies that are already on the platform and that have an established social media presence (a large number of followers/subscribers/comments/shares) to see what kind of content works well.

Come up with a social media schedule to keep you accountable or use a social media scheduling programme to plan ahead.

Create original content packed with personality and constantly monitor what works and what could be improved.

How to write a blog for your business

Tue, 14 Apr 2020 12:08:17 GMT

Whether you are an established business or a start-up, a blog is a great addition to your website. The right content will bring you more visitors than your product/ service pages alone.

But how do you write a blog for your business?

The most important thing to remember is that you are writing for your customers (or potential customers) . What topics are they interested in? What questions do they need answering? What tone of voice do they want to hear?

If you’re not sure what to write about, take time to brainstorm some topics – either relating directly to your products/ services or to issues in the wider industry.

The more niche or timely you can make your blog posts, the better.

Then write a plan and stick to it! Aim to mix your topics up, so you don’t have 10 consecutive weeks on your products before addressing an issue in the industry.

If your customers contact you with a question – either on your website, over the phone or in your physical store, think about writing a full answer as a blog post. Also take a look at Google’s search suggestions and related searches yourself to see if you can find inspiration for blog posts to drive more traffic to your website.

Every blog post should have a title that makes people want to read and which will also be picked up by search engines. The title should use keywords that people might type into a search engine to find out more information – just like the title of this post.

Create Valuable Readable Content

Your business blog needs to provide valuable content to your readers. A good blog can help make you a leading authority in your business sector. So write about the answers to visitors’ questions, solutions to their problems and issues in the wider industry or the news.

If you run a gardening business for example, you could write about how to deal with dry weather, what to plant in spring, which plants are good for attracting bees and the best way of dealing with weeds.

Your readers don’t want to read an essay when they visit your blog. They just want the information they are looking for. So keep your posts short – between 400 and 700 words is good.

If you occasionally need to write 1000 words, that’s OK, but make sure you keep it interesting! It may be that if you need to write that many words, you could split it into two posts.

Keep it Consistent

If you’re reading this and feel inspired to start your blog NOW, don’t write a post today, one tomorrow and one on Friday, then run out of ideas. Blog regularly and consistently – once a week is good, as is twice a week or once every two weeks. If your readers know you always post on a Tuesday, they will start to look out for your posts then (or maybe even subscribe to them).

Blogging shouldn’t just be informative, it should be fun. If it starts to feel like a chore, share the work around. Every team member will bring a slightly different perspective and will have different areas of expertise, so get them on board with writing posts. The different tones of voice will be interesting to your readers too (just make sure someone checks the spelling and grammar of all posts before they go live!).

Many blogs have a space for reader comments at the end. If you decide to go down this route, it is useful customer feedback and can potentially give you inspiration for future posts. Don’t forget to always politely respond to the comments, as it makes your business look caring and professional.

By following these tips, you should be able to write and sustain a successful blog for your business.

Remember that your blog isn’t about selling directly, it is more subtle than that.

Blogging for business is all about giving visitors extra value from your site, which should ultimately lead to more sales.

You can read more about the reasons for starting a blog for your business here .

How to create an email address on your domain with Google or Microsoft

Wed, 08 Apr 2020 08:33:12 GMT

So you’ve got your own business website with your own domain name, but have you got a professional looking email address to go with it?

Most people have got their own Gmail (or similar) email account, but it doesn’t look great from a professional point of view.

Customers expect an email address to match a website domain name.

If they don’t match, it tends to make people ask the sort of questions of a business that you would rather they didn’t ask. Can this company be trusted? Is this business too cheap or too lazy to purchase a domain email?

First impressions of a business count and these questions will damage the first impression you are trying to make.

Customers and prospective customers will be far more likely to trust an email address which includes your company name, so john.smith@tewkesburyconservatories.co.uk rather than john.smith@gmail.com

The good news is that it is very simple to use Gmail or Microsoft to set up a professional-looking email address on your own domain.

Standard @gmail.com emails are free, but there is a small price to pay to create and manage custom email addresses with Gmail based on your own domain name. Gmail’s premium package is called G Suite and costs £4.14 per month, with a 14 day free trial available.

When you set up your email with G Suite, it will ask if you have a domain name that you want to connect.

You then follow the user-friendly steps, including creating a main G Suite user, before you are able to verify and create your new email account and log in. When you have verified your own email address, you get the option to add others within your business to the main account.

Once you’ve gone through these steps, you’ll have a fully functioning email account (or several email accounts to include everyone in your company) for your domain name and you can begin using it with Gmail’s standard user interface.

Alternatively, you can set up a custom email address on your own domain name with Microsoft. Initially you start out with an email address in Office 365, ending in ‘onmicrosoft.com’, such as john@tewkesburyconservatories.onmicrosoft.com

To change your Microsoft email address to your own domain using the Microsoft 365 admin centre, you need to have a global admin account. Start by going to the admin centre at https://admin.microsoft.com

From there, it is very easy to set up your email address:

• Go to the Settings > Domains page.

• On the Domains page, select Add domain.

• Follow the steps to confirm that you own your domain and to change your email address.

This will give you a professional-looking, personalised email address for your business, such as john@tewkesburyconservatories.co.uk. You can also follow the process to set up emails on your domain for everyone in your company.

By spending just a little bit of time setting up an email address on your domain name, you will make your business appear more professional and trustworthy to customers.

Once you have these email addresses set up, customers and prospective customers who contact your business will have no idea that you are actually using Gmail or Microsoft to contact you and will simply see a professional business email address.

12 Ways to turn your Website into a Sales Superstar

Thu, 02 Apr 2020 11:47:59 GMT

Building a website that looks immaculate and does what it says on the tin is great, but if the traffic doesn't convert into real leads, are all those good looks really worth your time?

Conversion is pretty much the holy grail of digital marketing; it's the end goal that we all strive for, but only the best succeed.

There are many ways to ensure that your business has a constant flow of leads with a powerful conversion rate and to make sure you get the most out of your website we've collated some of the best.

Here are 12 tips for getting your visitors to take positive action on your website, whether that's filling out a form online, sharing posts through social media, or making a purchase.

1. Write a Clear Call to Action (CTA)

How many times have you landed on a website that had a form or a button that simply stated "submit" or "continue"?

Call to Action's are some of the most important factors when considering conversions as they convince users to take the course we want them to. If a CTA isn't precise there's a possibility that conversion rates will suffer.

Consider the language used on your landing page buttons and ensure that it's specific and clear.

Draw your visitors in with eye-catching images, links and fun animations.

Test out several variations of a CTA button and see which one performs the best. If you're using a "buy now" or "order now" button may perform differently depending on where they are placed, their size and colour.

2. Optimise Your Forms

Are your online forms doing everything they can to get website visitors over the finish line?

If the main purpose of your website is to gain leads via an enquiry form, then you should do everything in your power to make the process as quick and simple as possible for a customer.

A form should be above the fold on your landing page so that the prospect doesn't have to scroll down the page to access it. Otherwise. this could leave the potential customer unsure of the next step to take or how to obtain the

promoted offer.

The easier the form is to fill out, the more likely it is that someone will complete it. Forms should focus on getting leads into the sales funnel rather than obtaining a customer's personal details.

Remember: You can always ask any additional questions later on in the sales process.

Ensure that forms are user friendly and easy to complete on mobile, tablet and desktop. Any text should be easy to read and the form should fit within the device's screen. To check the mobile compatibility of your website's contact form, put the URL into Google's mobile-friendly testing tool.

3. Use Heat Maps and Polls

Information is power and heat maps are great to help you to understand a user's behaviour. If a picture is worth a thousand words, a single heatmap is worth a thousand numbers. They show which parts of your site are most engaging to visitors and give you useful insights into which pages are most visited, whether visitors make it to the bottom of your page and if they are ignoring any call to action's.

There's no doubt that heatmaps are unique and provide answers that no other tool can. However, that doesn't mean they can tell you everything. They should be seen as one more hammer in your toolbox, one that works best when combined with others; this is where polls come in.

If visitors are bypassing your CTA button, consider setting up a user poll asking visitors what's keeping them from taking action. It's best to provide positive answers to choose from, for example: "I need more information", "This isn't something I need right now" or "I'm not quite ready".

4. Use Video to Humanise Your Brand

Visual content creates a deep connection between the brand and the viewer and if done right it can boost your engagement rate into the clouds. According to Brightcove's 2018 Video Marketing Survey, 53% of consumers report that they engage with a brand after viewing one of their videos on social media, which illustrates the importance of using video as an effective form of marketing.

According to Hubspot a video on your landing page can increase your conversion rate by 80% and 64% of customers are more likely to buy a product online after watching a video about it.

If you don't have time for video you could try experimenting with GIFs (think video but faster) which automatically run, making them impossible to go unnoticed. GIFs attract attention and can quickly turn initial curiosity into genuine interest.

GIFs work particularly well for tech companies as they can simply explain a complex and technical solution by giving a quick visual walkthrough of how it works.

Photo by Mateus Campos Felipe on Unsplash

5. Meet the Expectations of Your PPC Visitors

If visitors are coming to your landing page via a Pay Per Click (PPC) advert, make sure that your copy is consistent throughout. You need to take into account the customer's expectations and their intent. In other words, understanding what they actually want to see, and what they actually want to do.

If you are doing the job half right, an ad should lead to a landing page that is specifically designed to mirror the text on that particular click through. For instance, if someone types in "different types of road bikes" and clicks on your PPC ad, they will expect to land on a page that is about different types of road bikes.

6. Create Content Rich in SEO

If you haven't heard it yet, "content is king" and one of the easiest ways to create a regular stream of SEO content on your website is by including a blog. When a site has great content, it draws in lots of organic traffic . Blog pages are more engaging and are more likely to attract visitors than product pages, plus they help increase your authority in your field.

Don't discount those product pages though, they can serve as both SEO content and a pay-per click landing page. An integral part of this content is finding important keywords and phrases that your audience use to search on Google. You can take advantage of Google Keyword Planner, which is a free tool to find out terms and phrases that your audience use most. Once you have compiled a list of key terms, you should then incorporate them naturally into your content.

If your content is informative and well written, it is more likely that Google will rank your website higher, allowing you to pull in a steady audience of loyal, consistent visitors.

7. Improve Your Site Speed

No matter how much time and effort goes into creating a website, viewers will quickly leave if it doesn't grab their attention. Window of engagement is smaller than ever these days, so you've got to be quick off the mark.

A one second delay in a page response can result in a 7% reduction in conversions, 16% decrease in customer satisfaction and 11% fewer page views according to Kissmetrics.

In fact 47% of consumers expect websites to load in two seconds or less - and 40% will abandon a page that takes three or more seconds. This means that if your site takes more than three seconds to load, you lose almost half of your visitors before they even arrive on your site, which has a huge impact on any potential conversions.

When Firefox reduced average load times by 2.2 seconds, they increased conversions by 15.4%. This means that having a fast site is essential, not just for ranking high on Google, but for keeping your bottom-line profits high.

There are a number of steps you can take to speed up your website, but firstly consider resizing the images on your website with tinypng.com, compress your site and install Google PageSpeed.

8. Be Present on Social Media

A powerful presence that promotes engagement and organic leads. If you have a blog make sure to connect it to any social media you may have so that they work seamlessly and promote your online brand.

Whenever you publish content on your website, ensure that you link it through your social media channels and encourage users to share your content. Make sure you include icons and buttons at the bottom of any blog posts so that readers can instantly share content with their own networks.

Content marketing is also essential for both website and social media as it engages an audience through elaborative content. Directing social media followers to your website ensures that the prospects can then browse other blog posts and web pages, potentially converting to paying customers. By generating more traffic to your website through social media, you're also improving the likelihood that your content will be shared elsewhere online, leading to an improved SEO meaning your website will rank more highly for relevant search terms.

9. Get Mobile.

It is absolutely essential in today's world that you ensure your website is optimised for mobile. We are no longer living in a world where smartphone users can be considered as the exceptions.

Did you know that mobile devices account for approximately half of web traffic worldwide?

According to Statista, in the first quarter one 2019, mobile devices (excluding tablets) generated 48.71% of global website traffic. If you don't want to miss out you need to ensure your website can be viewed perfectly from any device.

10. Develop Thank You Pages

Even after you've captured your lead or completed a conversion it is fundamental that you remember to say thank you. Not only do these pages notify the customer that their enquiry has been received so they leave feeling satisfied but also allow for next steps.For example, if you link to a blog post or your homepage this keeps the customer engaged and on your website for longer.

Don't be hesitant to include exploratory links on this page either, showing other products or services that customers may be interested in. You never know, it may even push them towards another conversion!

11. Use Exit-Intent Popups

We think that these are an absolute game changer. Exit-Intent technology detects your visitor's mouse behaviour and gives you the ability to trigger a pop up just as the user is about to leave the page.

You can use this in whatever way you want, either by creating a special offer to re-engage the visitor or by prompting them to subscribe to your mailing list in return for a download. If a visitor is on your blog why not use these pop ups and trigger a message to them, giving the option to save the article before they leave,? You can send a PDF version of the post to their email which means that you also get the opportunity to bag a lead.

If your company celebrates holidays such as Christmas, Easter etc then create special seasonal offers to appear on the screen to keep your website fun and popping with style.

12. Create Legendary Landing Pages

Landing pages are like the ultimate sales pitch of your company and as a result you want to ensure they are direct, intriguing and totally irresistible. Our attention spans are getting shorter and shorter so by creating a landing page that gets to the point and keeps the user focused on your CTA you're sure to capture a higher rate of conversion.

Use relevant keywords to keep your landing page in Google's good books without cluttering up the screen with unnecessary text. If you need to explain something why not use animation or images to keep things clear and eye- catching.

Remember that one size doesn't fit all, what may work for one landing page may not necessarily work for another.

Revist your website, gather the appropriate data and insights on your visitor behaviour and be sure to get your website working at optimum speed. Use the relevant tools to keep testing features and watch as your conversions rocket.

You can download and keep this article here.

COVID-19 and Online Food Ordering

Thu, 02 Apr 2020 10:21:47 GMT

Coronavirus (Covid-19) has changed the way we all do business. Whether you are a pub or restaurant which is new to food deliveries, or a takeaway which has only previously dealt with cash orders, you will need to set up an online/cashless ordering system so that you can continue to trade safely and legally.

Here at Cotswold Web, we can quickly set up a free online ordering system for your restaurant, pub or takeaway business.

Online ordering will keep both your staff and customers safe.

As the coronavirus pandemic escalates, government advice is that we can no longer leave home for ‘non-essential’ reasons. A dramatic fall in customer numbers puts businesses and jobs at risk, but setting up online takeaway ordering can help drive sales and turn things around for your business.

Keep Your Customers Safe

Customers want to limit their exposure to the outside world, while the most vulnerable people have been told they mustn’t leave their homes for 12 weeks.

Enabling no-contact deliveries on your website and minimum exposure pick-ups is the best way of keeping everyone safe.

Orders can be delivered on foot, by bicycle, motorbike or car, and simply left outside a customer’s door for them to pick-up – maintaining the safe 2 metre distance. Delivery staff can pick up the orders from the door of your business to limit exposure even further.

Keep it Cashless

Experts fear that cash could spread the virus, so it is essential to have a cashless system and online payments to slow down the spread. We can set up a payment system for customers to pay either by card or PayPal.

The online takeaway ordering software is so easy to set up you will be able to take your first online orders within hours, either directly from your own website, Facebook page or your own custom restaurant app.

To reassure customers that you take safety seriously, we can add a clear announcement across all of your pages to say that you only accept cashless payments, to protect customers and staff alike.

The more transparent you are about your food safety and Covid-19 practices, the more people will trust and re-order from your pub, restaurant or takeaway.

Cotswold Web can also add a food safety page to your site, to reassure customers that the staff preparing and delivering their food are healthy.

The system also allows you to add essential safety information to your receipts, such as the name and body temperature of the chef preparing the food and the delivery person.

Who's it for?

This service is available for, but not limited to:

• Pubs

• Restaurants

• Fish and chip shops

• Indian takeaways

• Chinese takeaways

• Pizza takeaways

• Kebab shops

• Coffee shops

• Sandwich shops

We're here for you so that you can be there for your customers

While a move towards online cashless deliveries is essential during the coronavirus crisis, don’t forget that many customers will be looking for this at other times too.

Spending some time setting up the system now won’t be wasted and will be an investment in the future of your business.

Get in touch with us to find out how we can add online ordering software to your site and help get your safe online food delivery service up and running.

Why you should start a blog for your business

Wed, 01 Apr 2020 12:03:10 GMT

A blog on your business website won’t bring you direct sales, so what is the point in ‘wasting’ time on it?

Actually, there are a lot of very good reasons why you should start a blog for your business (and a good blog CAN boost your sales ).

A blog on your organisation’s website should help your customers and potential customers, as well as your business. Some of the reasons for starting a blog for your business are:

Helping customers to solve problems and resolve issues

Presenting your brand as a leading authority in your niche

Building awareness of your brand

Improving SEO (search engine optimisation) and therefore bringing more visitors to your site

Most website visitors will feel more positive about your company after reading your blog – as long as it meets their needs. If you are solving their problems or giving them information they can’t find elsewhere, your blog becomes a very useful resource. This means your brand goes up in their estimation and they are more likely to consider buying from you.

Your blog is your voice and it’s a great way for you to introduce yourself and your company to potential customers. The language and tone of voice you use in your blog should portray your business in the right way. Most blogs favour language which is light and easy to understand to help them reach the biggest potential audience. But if the subject of your blog is serious, it’s important to change the tone to match the topic and avoid alienating your readers.

Figures from HubSpot show that small companies with a blog get 55% more visitors to their websites and have 102% more followers on Twitter than similar businesses. Every one of those extra visitors and followers is a potential customer and will help give your company the edge over your competitors.

Whether you are blogging about your products or issues in the wider industry, you should end your post with a call to action for your readers. This could be to sign up for a free report with more information on the topic, to follow you on social media or to visit your product pages.

You can measure the success of your blog in a number of ways – it could be numbers of readers, ranking on search engines or organic traffic to your blog. Alternatively, you could measure increases in sales (particularly where a blogpost focuses on a particular product or service), clicks on links within your blog or the number of subscribers signing up for your emails.

Focus on the same success measures for each blog post to help you determine which topics or style of posts are the most successful, to help you plan future posts and build your blog.

By putting in the work and focusing on what you want to achieve for your business from your blog, you will gain more credibility in your niche, more traffic, more leads and ultimately more sales.

Not sure how to go about starting your blog? You can read about How to write a blog for your business here .

Cotswold Web

Content Marketing Success: 8 Proven Strategies for Small Businesses

2025 Content Marketing: Tips, Statistics, and Strategies for Success

Key Trends for 2025

Content Marketing Statistics You Need to Know

Current Metrics and Benchmarks

Impact of Content Marketing on ROI

Industry Specific Statistics

Tips for Creating Content in 2025

Understanding Your Audience

Utilising SEO Best Practices

Leveraging Multimedia Content

Content Marketing Examples and Case Studies

Successful B2B Content Marketing Campaigns

Innovative Digital Marketing Strategies

Lessons Learned from Top Brands

The Role of Content Marketing in B2B

Benefits of Content Marketing for B2B Companies

Forms of B2B Content Marketing

How Content Marketing Can Help B2B Growth

Measuring the Success of Your Content Marketing

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

Tools for Measuring Content Marketing Success

Adjusting Strategies Based on Metrics

Advanced keyword research: Going beyond the basics

The role of user experience (UX) in SEO success

The impact of AI on SEO: How to stay competitive in the age of algorithms

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Conducting an SEO audit: Improving your website’s performance

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8. Highlight missing keywords

Carrying out an SEO audit is an opportunity to look at the keywords your competitors target – and most importantly whether you are missing out on any opportunities.

Redesigning your website: When and why your business needs it

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Users struggle with navigation

Visitors are leaving your site quickly

You’ve updated your brand

Your site is slow

You haven’t optimised for mobile

Your website doesn’t reflect your product range

Your competitor’s website looks better than yours!

You haven’t adapted with your consumers

Local SEO: Attracting customers in your area.

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How does it work?

Google My Business

Local keyword research ﻿

Create local content

Local backlinks

Locality specific landing pages

Automating your business with Connectors

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SEO vs PPC: Which delivers better ROI for your marketing budget?

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Why you need LinkedIn paid ads for your business

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Creating LinkedIn ads

Facebook Ads: Measure your conversions!

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Conversion rate

Conversion lift

Google Ads: Measure your conversions!

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Tracking your conversions

Conversion values

What is a ‘good’ conversion rate?

Fully responsive web design for your B2B professional services business

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Fully responsive web design for your B2B business

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Fully responsive web design for your countryside business

Booking Software

Booking software for your small holiday business

Booking Software

How ChatGPT can help your business

Getting started

Creating content

Customer support

Admin assistant

Writing emails

Local keyword research