SiteChooser Blog

Google Page One Faster

2011-05-25T22:13:00.000+01:00

Google Page One Faster as a search term is the highest ranked keyword that we have that delivers actual results to our telephone

These days everyone seems more interested in getting to google page one faster than ever before. Whilst I understand that Google represents around 65% of the total search traffic for the UK but by result that means that there will be 35% of the searches going elsewhere

Not all search engines are the same and many people chase the tail of getting to Google page one faster than any other search engine. However consider a simple business method of the successful for a moment.

Sometimes it's better to look at where people are coming from than follow them to where they are going. Getting there first is what society challenges us to do. However, we still give medals for silver and bronze.

Bing and Yahoo, silver and bronze if you like, are faster, potentially more reliable search engines than Google. Their results and indexations are less complicated and they deliver results from real people

I'm sure Google would love you to continue doing word of mouth advertising for them as we 'hooverise' our search terms to "google it". But next time you are trying to get a keyword on Google page one faster, spare a thought for Bing and Yahoo and monitor those results before ploughing ahead

Google Page One Guaranteed

2011-04-18T16:29:00.000+01:00

Every day we have enquires from companies that have tried many ways of getting their website onto page one of Google for some of their chosen keywords

Many people have websites that have not been updated since they were first launched, have become littered with errors and frankly probably don;t work too well.

New search enquires have no loyalty to any website, people vote with their feet. On average you have just seven seconds and three clicks to impress a new searcher. Remember, they are looking for the products or services they require and have found your website. If it's difficult to find what they want they will vanish almost as quickly as they found you

Every visitor should be treated as precious, they should enjoy the visual image of the site, feel comfortable with the navigation and hopefully reward you by making an enquiry.

If your visitor traffic is high but noone spends much time on your site and you receive very few enquiries the public are telling you something important.

If you don't fix your website you may as well not have it

If you'd like us to give you a free report on what you could do to turn your poor performing website into a genuine cash machine why not give us a call on 0121 661 9355

We guarantee to have your website performing on page one of Google

free local business website

2011-04-18T16:07:00.000+01:00

Every small business seminar I have been to lately has featured online marketing. Birmingham City Council, Barclays, Deliottes, every one of them has featured the importance of marketing a website.

There are very simple ways of getting new traffic to your website by simply making sure that your website address is included on all of your marketing materials. But that alone won't produce the joys that you see and hear other companies getting.

Google has a set of rules that it includes in it's Webmaster Central portion of their website. The rules are clear enough....if you understand the language but like most specialist fields they are made to appear much more difficult.

We run free seminars for small and medium sized businesses to show them what has been achieved by some of our existing clients.

We also offer training to anyone that wants to make their website come to life and start producing genuine enquiries.

Site2Rent was developed to offer SME's a free loacl business website operating for their trade or profession in the area they trade in. For example if you search accountant Coventry, or Coventry accountant you should find one of our websites on page one of Google,
www.coventry-accountant.co.uk

This site alone receives some 500 visitors per month and generates between 30 and 50 enquires per month. If you are an accountant in Coventry and enquiry is worth at least £1000 so if you were to get even 5 new clients a month your website is worth nearly £60,000 worth of new business every year

Imagine that......

Google Page One Faster

2011-04-18T15:48:00.000+01:00

Most people posting the search "Google page one faster" are searching for methods to bring their website onto the first page of Google to propel their business into the online market.

The reality is that gone are the days when you could produce a website and get a reasonable level of searches for your product or service just by having a website. With an estimated 8 million new websites being launched every month worldwide competition for places on page one of Google gets more fierce every day.

A recent CBI report showed that SME's who were trading online were growing four times faster that traditional retail businesses in the same market sector.

The UK is the largest buyer of products online in the UK and as Matt Brittin, CEO of Google UK said last week if you aren't making the most of online trading it's the same as having a retail show and keeping the door closed.

In 2010 UK companies spend 7%of GDP on online marketing to an audience of 1.8bn Internet users. By the end of this decade there will be 5bn people using the Internet for some 80% of their purchases. There will be 10bn mobile phone users accessing the Internet.

If you believe that this is the time to find out how your business could grow then we can offer you a free website, free hosting, free emails for twelve months to show you what can be acheived.

We'd like to hear from you, we won't bite, we won't talk jargon and we won't rip you off.

The Best Adwords Campaign

2010-12-23T13:05:00.000Z

Many businesses start their adventure with marketing their business online by setting up a Google Adwords account. For many people this represents no more than a dabble with the Internet in as cheap a way as it looks possible.

With the recession responsible for changing the way we think about advertising and expenditure it can seem like a cost effeective way of finding out how many people are searching and enquring about your products and services

However, as too many businesses have found out to their cost its more like a escalating addiction. Many people set a relatively low daily Adwords budget and then find that the fund has run out by 11am so they increase it. Often without any real regard for the results that have (or haven't) been achieved.

We have a range of pre-built and indexed sites for a vast array of business types in market specific areas and geographically targetted towns, counties and cities.

Put simply we build websites for a range of keywords that are searched in volume by the public. We then receive anything from hundreds to thousands of visitors to each site attracted by the accuracy of the search term they have selected and the page position of the website on Google.

We are website designers and search engine optimisers, we can make things happen on the Internet but we can't be all things to all men so we just can't help anyone calling for a taxi in Coventry or looking for a hairdresser in Basingstoke. That's where you come in!

The highest cost PPC Adwords on Google

2010-12-23T12:40:00.000Z

Google's income based sponsored links have caught the imagination of a huge number of businesses during 2010. Fuelled by the desire to gain more online business how have these fared?

We asked a number of businesses about their experience of using Google's PPC Adwords campaign.

For many they have started off with a relatively low PPC cost for a particular keyword and then dramatically increased as the competition has seen the same market and started their own PPC campaign

With only ten listings for organic (natural) websites to be listed on page one of Google PPC can look like a quick cheap fix for anyone wanting to simply see what the Internet can add to their business.

At this point it's worth mentioning that every time your competitors click your sponsored link they are costing you money. We have a number of clients in competing areas that are raging a personal war on their competitors. The only real winners here are Google themselves.

We offer an alternative that delivers a complete five page website, already indexed and appearing on page one of Google. We offer these for rental on either a fixed monthly rate or a rate per unique visitor (not to be confused with PPC which is per click, not per unique visitor)

If you are paying a huge sum for your PPC campaign maybe it's worth talking to us about a better way of achieving online results.

Choosing one of our sites will give you access to traffic for your chosen market, targetted traffic of UK visitors looking for your product or service now.

www.sitechooser.co.uk

Facebook Business Pages

2010-11-10T16:01:00.000Z

Facebook is now so popular that business owners can no longer consider it as a site only people who want to connect online.
In fact, in September 2010, Facebook surpassed Google in regards to the amount of time users spent on their site. Facebook now states that members spend over 700 billion minutes per month on Facebook! When you consider that there were over 33 billion searches on Google in the same month you have some idea how big Facebook really is. Everyone wants to get to page one of Google but when you have a captive audience of over 600 million active users isn’t it time that your business took advantage and had its own Facebook business page?
With Facebook’s incredible popularity across diverse age groups, integrated email applications, and now with the new Bing search integration. Now more than ever before Google has real competition and is in the process of having regular disagreements with Facebook. As a result of recent changes to include Bing search results on Facebook a user no longer need to visit Google for searches or log off to use an email application. All designed by Facebook to make sure that a member stays on the Facebook site longer and longer. Pretty soon they may be able to experience the Internet fully without leaving Facebook. Already more than 50% of the entire Facebook membership actively logs into Facebook every day, that’s over 300 million people! Facebook is now so important to your potential customers’ lives that it is essential for your business to have a Facebook business page where your prospects are hanging out on a daily basis.
If you’re not already convinced, let’s clear up a few things that we have found have confused business owners about Facebook. Firstly, a Business Page is not a personal profile, it’s a separate entity that shows exactly what you are good at.
Are Business Pages Also Called Fan Pages?
If you’ve been using Facebook for a while you may remember that Facebook used to call Business Pages – Fan Pages. Additionally, it used to be that someone became a fan of your Fan Page. Now they need to “like you.” By simply clicking the “like” button on your Facebook Business Page. Facebook may have changed the titles as they become more and more aware of their own global domination but a Fan Page is no different to a Business Page – they are one and the same.
All Facebook Business Pages start off with the set-up of a personal Facebook profile. You can’t just jump to the Facebook Business Page set up. This is because the email address and name that you use for your personal profile must be one connected to a person and not a general catchall email like info@mycompany.com. Ideally this should be an email address with restricted access. If you have an employee set up your Facebook Business Page account and the personal profile portion of your Facebook Business Page, you don’t want to connect the new account to the employee’s own personal email address. If the employee does ever leaves your employment, you could lose complete access to your Facebook Business Page, all of your accumulated fans, and potentially have no control over any of the content on your Facebook Business Pages after their departure.

Why Exactly Would a Business Owner Want a Business Page?
Facebook Business Pages provide a perfect opportunity to contact all people who “Like” your Facebook Business Page with one click newsletters, interactive discussion questions, creating a forum, setting up events and inviting fans to attend, and even the ability to create specialised welcome and shopping pages. Your Facebook Business Page operates like a mini website with a captive audience of 600 million potential customers
Creating Your Business Page Vanity URL
Once you have 25 people who have clicked that they “Like” your Facebook Business Page, you can select a short and easy to remember name to promote your Facebook Business Page on your website and business card.
Your Facebook Business Page goes having a long and meaningless URL to one that simply says www.facebook.com/yourbusiness. It is very important to understand that once you have selected your Facebook URL you will not be able to change the name, so select carefully.
Best Practice Tips for Keeping Your New Facebook Business Page Updated
Sometimes new Facebook Business Page owners get excited and post what seems like a constant flow of information on their wall. It is important to understand that what you post on your wall is posted on the wall of the people who have clicked “Like” on your page. We are able to handle all of the Facebook Business Page updating on your behalf. Facebook is not likeTwitter where the more posts, or “tweets” as they are called create greater responses. On Facebook Business Pages 5 to 10 status updates a day could get you blocked or hidden by fans when they feel you have inundated their wall with your daily or hourly updates.
Conclusion
We hope that this has helped to introduce you to Facebook Business Pages. If you haven’t set up a Facebook Business Page, now’s the time to consider it before someone else does. Facebook is only getting more popular and is actively seeking to encourage the business community into their website with demographic based pay per click advertising and the new integrated search with Bing.com. We would be more than happy to show you some of the ideas that we have used to not only create Facebook Business Pages for business owners. More importantly we’d love to show you what effect a Facebook Business Page has had on creating new business opportunities.
If you’d like a free, no obligation chat about how we can help establish your business with a Facebook Business Page of its own then send us an email and we’ll be more than happy to talk you through what’s involved
________________________________________

Free business website, a free business website on page one of Google

2010-10-20T13:19:00.000+01:00

Yes, that’s right, a free business website, already built and delivering visitors from page one of Google

Too good to believe?

Why not give us a call and see what we have available

It doesn’t matter what you do, what trade or market sector you are in the effect of having a website on page one of Google will lift your enquiry rate and give us a level of currently untapped new business enquiries

Our websites are all w3c compliant, full of genuine content and five pages of images and text designed to deliver visitors to the site and ultimately to make your phone ring…..and ours

Lots of websites have already been delivered to more than happy customers but the titles are in short supply so if you are looking to increase or even start your online marketing experience then we are definitely someone you should be talking to

Google page one faster than a Ferrari

2010-10-13T16:28:00.000+01:00

Success is reguarly measured in pounds, shillings and pence, despite the fact that some of those currencies haven't been in circulation since 1972 (decimilisation...from memory)

Naturally the USA measure their success in dollars and cents

Our clients measure our success for them in terms of the number of visitors that visit their site or the number of times the phone rings with a new order from a brand new client who says "I found you on Google"

We're not unique but we are really unusual in that we measure our own success in terms of results, all of our search engine optimisation, SEO is by results. We either make a charge in pennies for each unique visitor the site receives or we charge a rate per month for each keyword phrase that appears on page one of Google. Everyone wants to be on page one of Google but the relaity is that only ten websites will appear there. If you are one of the ten websites on page one of Google then you have a realistic chance of securing around 10% of the search traffic for a particular term.

Imagine the difference to your balance sheet of having a new machine that simply generates cash? A machine no bigger than a laptop producing new money every month. Sounds good? It should be there isn't a business in the world that wouldn't benefit from more enquiries and we have had some spectacular results for local and national businesses simply by getting them onto page one of Google.

If you'd like your laptop turned into a cash machine then why not drop us an email or call us? We can have your business on Google page one faster than your Internet signal and we don't charge you a penny until it's there

Google page one fast, even faster than a bullet

2010-10-11T16:12:00.000+01:00

For those of you that don't believe in the value of blogs and blogging generally it may be of interest to learn that the blog from Friday 8th October 2010 under the title "Google page one, faster than a cup of tea" was indexed and searched on page one of Google no fewer than 126 times within two hours of being posted.

For those searchers who had simply typed "Google page one faster" the results were clear to see and from an impact point of view delivered no fewer than four new enquires to Sitechooser for search engine optimisation in Birmingham alone.

If you were looking to add a blog to your existing website then why not give us a call, it can be completed same day and will cost you around £100 to set up. Compare that to the cost of any other form of advertising and delivering new enquiries and you'll soon realise what an excellent ROI that is.

From a practical point of view we took about half an hour aside a day to write a new blog posting and sit back and wait for the results.

Some days we target words like "website design Birmingham" and on other days we are more inventive and target real buying words like "pay by result SEO Birmingham" either way it produces new enquiries which allow is to have a steady flow of new enquiries every day.

Is this something you are interested in?

www.sitechooser.co.uk

Google page one, faster than a cup of tea

2010-10-08T14:51:00.000+01:00

It’s been a really busy time at Sitechooser with the launch of a complete squadron of local business websites that are currently focusing on delivering local visitors to businesses in Birmingham, Coventry, Solihull and Leamington Spa

We recognise that as the financial economy starts to recover businesses will again gain the confidence to promote themselves online. Many businesses are put off by the cost of building a new website and the search engine optimisation costs that are needed to have a website appearing on page one of Google or other major search engines such as Bing and Yahoo and even dear old Ask Jeeves, although I haven’t personally asked Jeeves anything for months as his search engine is so crammed with sponsored links that I can’t see the real company results!

We believe that we have the answer for any company that is looking for a real online presence to get real customers in Birmingham, Coventry, Solihull or Leamington Spa

Have a look at some of the websites we’ve launched this month and track their performance as they leap onto page one of Google

www.accountant-solihull.co.uk

www.birmingham-bathroom.co.uk

www.birmingham-carpets.co.uk

www.birmingham-garage.co.uk

www.birmingham-kitchen.co.uk

www.birmingham-printer.co.uk

www.birmingham-weddings.co.uk

www.coventry-accountant.co.uk

www.coventry-builder.co.uk

www.coventry-catering.co.uk

www.coventry-florists.co.uk

www.coventry-hairdressers.co.uk

www.coventry-printers.co.uk

www.coventry-restaurant.co.uk

www.coventry-taxi.co.uk

www.garage-birmingham.co.uk

www.leamington-carpets.co.uk

www.leamington-restaurant.co.uk

www.leamingtonflorists.co.uk

www.solihull-florist.co.uk

www.solihull-kitchens.co.uk

www.solihull-plumbers.co.uk

www.solihull-solicitor.co.uk

www.solihullbuilder.co.uk

www.solihullhairdresser.co.uk

www.solihullrestaurant.co.uk

www.taxi-solihull.co.uk

www.weddingscoventry.co.uk

Or if you’d prefer just do a simple search in Google, Bing or Yahoo for “weddings Coventry” and see how the website www.weddingscoventry.co.uk is appearing?

All of these websites are available to rent on a monthly basis for a ridiculously low figure. If you’d like to find out what the new enquiries from any of these new websites for Birmingham, Coventry or Leamington Spa is worth to you consider the following

If you were a wedding company based in Coventry and the following search engines produced these monthly search volumes

Search Term Google Yahoo Bing

Weddings Coventry 5400 1450 580

If you are on page one of all of these search engines then you could reasonably expect around 10% of the searchers to visit your site, based on these figures you would have 742 new visitors each month

If only 10% of the website visitors make an enquiry and only half of them become customers then you’d be handling another 37 new weddings a month

Imagine how much that could be worth?

Now stop imagining it, give us a call and we could turn the enquiry tap on in less time than it takes to make a cup of tea

Mission - Anything's Possible

2010-07-23T11:12:00.000+01:00

Hello All

OK. What's "Mission - Anything's Possible" all about then?

It's about SEO. Yes, that old chestnut. Anyone can do it, as long as you have access to your webcode and a little determination. What I intend to do over the next few weeks is to begin a step-by-step, daily SEO action plan. The idea being, you read the post, carry out the action (5 to 10 minutes of your precious time) and then carry on as normal but with a little more spring to your step, safe in the knowledge that today you did a little work "on" your business rather than just "in" the business.

Right, without further ado here is today's action :

Identify a forum related to your business by searching using your chosen search engine.
Sign up, create an account whatever's required.
Find a category to contribute to.
Post a helpful post and don't forget to include your chosen keyword and your domain name.

That's it. Simple Eh? Do this everyday if you can, find a few different forums. I will be giving frequent reminders.

If you need any assistance at all with this action, please contact us at http://www.sitechooser.co.uk/ and we'll be more than happy to help.

Website Tuner

2010-02-25T23:07:00.004Z

SiteChooser are pleased to announce the launch of www.websitetuner.co.uk, a completely free of charge report on the very foundations of your website.

Before spending huge amounts of money on detailed reports or SEO specialists, have you stopped to think whether the basic building blocks of your website are correct? If your website has issues at the very base of it, no amount of money or specialist help will bring you the results you crave. The first thing any good SEO specialist will say is “we need to get your code sorted out before we do anything else”.

Most people start looking into purchasing complex reports about their website in the hope that they will be able to decipher what it is their website is missing, in most cases there is a very simple reason that is stopping your website from performing better with the major search engines.

The basic code and building blocks that make up your website has errors.

Errors within your website will in extreme cases stop a search engine being able to index your website completely and even minor mistakes will result in your website being deemed not as relevant as other sites that are written correctly.

Do not spend money on expensive reports or search engine optimisation until the foundations of your website are sound and solid. Build on it before this and the whole thing could topple over, build on a safe foundation and the thing will just get stronger and stronger.

www.websitetuner.co.uk provides a completely free of charge, straight forward report on the actual foundations of your website, what code errors exist (if any), where they are and we’ll even give our complete and honest opinion as to what we think of your site - with no holds barred. Whether your website makes sense, whether we’d read it if we weren’t being paid to and whether it’s obvious what goods or services you’re trying to sell.

Our report is comprehensive but uncomplicated in its design. You can use the data we provide to either repair the errors yourself, pass the report to your web designer or if you don’t know where to start, we can provide you with a no obligation quotation to carry out the repairs for you.

The Website Tuner report is available completely free of charge, delivered by email usually within 48 hours. The report is available for business websites only, of up to 10 pages, should anyone wish to order a report on a larger site, please request a report by visiting www.websitetuner.co.uk and completing our request form and we’ll see what we can do.

Why should your school have a website?

2010-02-12T14:30:00.003Z

Why should your school have a website?

A school website is an effective and fast becoming essential way of communicating with your school's wider community, including parents, pupils and prospective pupils.A properly constructed school website is an information system far more powerful than anything else your school can provide to the wider community. A good school website will efficiently structure content, images, communications and an extensive array of multimedia technology that will leave your visitors with a far greater knowledge and insight into your school than any other form of media would have the ability to do.

Most schools may already have an online presence and feel that they have satisfied the requirements of their parents need for online information. However, if your school website was built a few years ago and has not been updated since (most haven’t), are you really supplying the information both current parents and pupils would wish to have access to. Such as when is the next PTA meeting, when is the next recorder practice, what date is half term holiday?

So, if your school website states that your reception class will be enjoying Spanish lessons this term, although the person who did provide the Spanish lessons has not done so for 2 years or so – is that providing a good service to your current crop of parents and students? Your school sits at the centre of the local and wider community and should have an obligation to link to the community and assist it as much as possible.

Ask yourself, or, raise the question at the next PTA meeting – what should be the role of your school website?

To provide up to date and useful information?
To accurately portray the overall spirit of the school?
To bring together the community?
To advise of its mission within the community?
To gain market research and parent and pupil opinion?
To reduce some of your support and customer service costs?
To make a wider audience aware of the schools work?
To find new students?
To conduct e-commerce for school items?
To reduce printing and mailing costs?

Ask yourself, how many of these criteria your school website is currently succeeding in.
A lot of parents these days search for schools online by visiting websites and comparing features, will your school website stand up against the next one down the road if you haven’t detailed any of the valuable improvements you have made over the last few years on your website?

At www.sitechooser.co.uk/School-Websites/ we pride ourselves on providing you with the website your school and its community deserves. Our services are hassle free and surprisingly cost effective. Whether you require a completely new school website or your old site updating, we can assist you and make the whole process completely stress free from start to finish.
All of our school websites and nursery websites are produced by our in-house team of professional website and graphic designers. Over 90% of our work comes through referrals from existing and satisfied clients.

At SiteChooser School Websites we guarantee that our school website code is 100% valid against the very latest industry guidelines. With search engines becoming smarter all the time, there has never been a more important time to have valid website code. A school website with valid website code will invariably perform better with major search engines than a website with code errors. In fact, should a site have too many code errors, search engines will not be able to read the content of a website and it will then not feature in their listings at all.

Should you be thinking of appointing a website designer to produce your new school website, run a few of their portfolio sites through the following free web code checker found at http://validator.w3.org/, if the sites you check return with errors it may be time to give SiteChooser a call.

Why is it so important for your school to be online?

The latest industry reports show that 82% of consumers use search engines first to find information online, that includes searching for information on schools and nurseries.

Visit www.sitechooser.co.uk/School-Websites and ask us for a no obligation chat to discover just how easy it can be to put your school at the very heart of your community.

School and Nursery Websites

2010-02-09T14:05:00.003Z

We are proud to unveil a revamped section of our website.

http://www.sitechooser.co.uk/School-Websites/ has been created to replace our childcare section.

The area will provide information for childrens nursery, primary school, secondary school, academy, college and university websites, along with a new service providing search engine optimisation in respect of the same.

Feel free to have a look and refer us to any of your friends or colleagues who may work in the education sector.

Search Engine Optimisation

2010-02-05T13:15:00.001Z

How can companies know if they are getting value for money from their SEO?

It is astonishing some of the high rates that are being quoted to small businesses, sometimes, many thousands of pounds without any guarantee for success.

Without question, some people are being taken advantage of due to their own lack of knowledge within the SEO field. As time moves on, companies of all shapes and sizes will become more informed and more aware of what is fast becoming a vital service. Competition will increase enormously and consequently, more reasonable rates will be offered to those that are seeking an affordable route to advertising their company website.

Some of our smaller clients often get suckered in to paying ridiculous prices for advertising in online business directories, even though most of them are worthless schemes that are dramatically overpriced. Yet another example on how the uninformed are being taken advantage of. A huge amount of our customers remain wary of using SEO services to work on their own website, yet they will hand their money over to A N Other business directory without any guarantee of success because they’ve been drawn in by the sales spiel.

It becomes increasingly infuriating when clients, who wanted to spend as little as possible on their web design, call back and complain that the website that we designed for them is not generating the new business they had been expecting. These are the very same people who were not interested in having any SEO carried out on their new website but have since handed over hundreds of pounds to highly polished salesmen from Business Directories.

In conclusion, the only way that the average person is going to understand the importance of SEO services is to actually talk through what is available with their website designers. After having been referred to us by a trusted source, having received the website you wanted at the price you wanted, having been shown that the code within the site is without error, having seen your new site get listed with the major search engines – WHY OH WHY do you then go and give your hard earned money to a business directory and not talk to your web designer.

SiteChooser are happy to provide SEO services only based upon success – YES we do provide a guarantee.

Visit us at www.sitechooser.co.uk to get in touch and find out how you can get true value for money on SEO services.

Rescue Your Website

2010-01-21T14:18:00.002Z

We got just a little bit too fed up with incorrect web code, so we're attempting to do something about it.

We've just launched www.rescueyourwebsite.co.uk, here you can buy a simple little report that will identify all of the code errors on your site, simply pass the report on to your web designer and say 'Fix that lot buster or you'll get a punch up the trumpet'.

If they won't or can't, go to www.sitechooser.co.uk and ask us to do it for you.

We'd be only too delighted.

Let it stop, let it stop, let it stop

2010-01-13T10:06:00.003Z

Waking wearily ready for a second day back in the office, my wife tells me it's been snowing again. Another thick layer of snow greets me from my bedroom window and I know it's another day that I will be working from home.

The kids are off school again and even they're seeing it as a bit of white prison now, we're not used to it, we don't like it and to be honest, we're sick of seeing it.

I will endeavour, along with my colleagues, to work from our kitchens and dining rooms to continue to improve the services offered at www.sitechooser.co.uk , the old blitz spirit will kick in with CMS and childcare sites being produced by the barrowload.

I'm sure we'll look back at the photo's of the snowmen built and sledging downhill with much fondness in sunnier times, but for now, I just want to go to work.

School Websites

2010-01-11T11:37:00.005Z

In this time of snow, ice, traffic chaos and school closures, I have discovered (in the main) just how dreadful school websites are for the local community.

I have investigated most of the schools that are local to me and they all have massive shortcomings. Websites that are dreadfully out of date, dozens of broken links, big sections that are unfinished, nigh on impossible to navigate and virtually all of them designed by someone who works for the school in some capacity.

Surely our teachers time would be better spent doing what they do best, I'm sure most schools have a budget with which to service their website needs, give it to an experienced web designer who for a small fee will give your school something to be proud of and might just make the local community look at it.

My own childrens website was updated to say when the school was closed due to the snow but the rest of the website is mostly unfinished at best, it's been this way for about 6 months.

So a message to headteachers up and down the land, pay someone to do the school website for you and stop worrying about when you'll get time to finish yourself. A correctly assembled website will be more search engine friendly, be of more use to parents and pupils and most importantly - yes you will be able to update it yourself with important messages such as 'school shut yet again due to snow'.

www.sitechooser.co.uk/School-Websites will be updated over the next few days to make it blindingly obvious to headteachers everywhere just how they should spend some of that IT budget for the good of the school and the local community.

New Year Resolution

2010-01-08T15:47:00.002Z

With the New Year and about 6 inches of snow upon us, a friend of mine imparted upon me some words of wisdom. His New Year Resolution "Do at least a little bit of marketing every day".

Something so simple but so overlooked. We often find ourselves victim of the lack of phone ringing or email enquiries drying up, then the penny drops as per usual that we have to get our fingers out and fight for the little bit of custom that's still out there.

All of us at www.sitechooser.co.uk will be trying to copy my friends New Year resolution as best we can for 2010.

Right, I'm off to do my bit for our marketing strategy.

What's that? Snowball fight, I'll just grab my hat.

Getting your website content right

2009-07-30T21:03:00.002+01:00

It's stating the obvious that your website content is what your visitors are there to see. So it's important that they like what they see, right? Up to now in our blog we've harped on a bit about how the back end code needs to be spot on and how easily a client who isn't clued up with regards to web design, might have the wool pulled over. Even if your code is perfect, if your visible content is full of bad grammar and spelling, or is poorly laid out - you run the risk that your visitors will get that impression of your company.

For a lot of your site visitors, when they land on your website that may be the very first time that they have encountered your company. First impressions are important, a shabby website makes your company look shabby, simple as that. Here are a few of our pet hates when it comes to website content and layout:

1) Bad spelling - no excuses for this one, spell checkers don't require scientific expertise.

2) Bad grammar - not everyone's going to pick this up but a discerning visitor will and again
there's no excuse because your average spell checker usually checks grammar too.

3) Missing links - how exasperating is it when you think you've found your area of interest on a
site and the link doesn't work?

4) Boring technical jargon - If you can get away from it, please do - the last thing you want to do
is alienate a potential customer because they don't even understand your web content.

5) Rough images or dodgy flash - looks cheap and nasty, even MS paint gives you smooth edges
and if your flash isn't "flash" then steer clear because that kind of defeats the object.

Every potential customer arrives at your website with this in mind, "What's in it for me? What can I get from this company that I might not be able to get elsewhere?" and that's exactly what you need to answer in your homepage content. Provide your visitors with exactly what they need and make sure they know how damned capable you are!
Alternatively, give us a buzz and we'll do it for you.

Simple website check

2009-07-10T14:06:00.003+01:00

In preparation of our new website www.rescueyourwebsite.co.uk I thought I'd point out a real simple way of checking whether the basics of your website are up to scratch.

We always point our clients towards http://validator.w3.org/ to check whether the fundamentals of their website are correct. It's dead simple to use, simply pop your website address in the W3C address bar and click on the check button. If the coding for the page is spot on you'll get a lovely green return telling you everything is hunky dorey, if it returns a red page however, this shows what coding errors exist on that particular page. This can then be printed off and given to your website designer with the message 'sort that lot out or I'm off'.

At www.sitechooser.co.uk we're proud that every site we produce carries the W3C code validation button at the foot of the page, this is our clear statement that we respect the code of the page and have spent our time in making it correct.

It's simple for you to check whether your site has been written as it should be, why not check yours now? If there are issues with your code and your existing designer either can't be bothered to put them right or god forbid doesn't have the knowledge to correct them, give SiteChooser a call and we'll advise you how we can help you out.

Once again, give your code the love it deserves.

Don't feel tied in

2009-07-07T15:47:00.003+01:00

We've had two new clients this week who've called us for advice on their existing sites, in short their existing website company wasn't doing what they'd been asking for on the site and their relationship had become strained - they felt caught between the devil and the deep blue sea.

We simply advised them to transfer their domain out to another provider so they can gain ownership of it and get another designer to do the work they're after, namely us. It works for the client as he feels he's moving forward and more often than not it works for the previous web designer as they've probably been avoiding the clients calls for weeks.

Hey, who said it was a perfect world, people fall out some times.

The prospect of transferring out a domain name tends to fill some people with a little dread as they feel they may lose control of it and some lurking despot on the web will snap it up. It's dead simple, most reputable domain name providers will offer the option of tranferring a domain name in, obviously they want the work going forward. The existing registrant has to unlock it with the current provider, once again something that is relatively straight forward to do, he then has to put in what's called an IPS tag, this is simply a name for the company that the domain name is being transferred to. You then ask the new domain name company to transfer it in and they'll do the rest. Some people worry that their site will be down for ages during the process, it doesn't have to be. Keep an eye out for when your site goes down and then you know the new provider has control of the domain, the site can then be re-uploaded. What's a little downtime on a site you're not happy with and if you're honest, visitors probably aren't finding it too often anyway, hence you wanting to change it. It's far better to get the site into your own name and make the changes you want than just leaving it there to rot.

Alternatively do what our two new clients have done this week and visit www.sitechooser.co.uk and ask us to do the transfer process and the website changes for you.

Links gone mad

2009-07-06T16:32:00.001+01:00

http://www.blogcatalog.com/directory/internet/web_design

Let's try and get noticed

2009-07-06T15:13:00.001+01:00

c6ra8ji45v

Pulling the wool over their eyes.

2009-07-06T14:03:00.004+01:00

We've been a bit infuriated this week.

We spend ages trying to get our clients websites just right and ready for the big bad world of the Internet, then we check what some members of the competition are doing and it drives us mad.

Are we the only people who think that the code behind a site should be valid and correct, the amount of sites we're coming across that look real nice cosmetically, the owners of the sites are happy with them because they look pretty, but, look behind the scenes and the web code is as messy as an upturned plate of spaghetti.

They come to www.sitechooser.co.uk and ask us why they aren't getting business through their website or even any enquiries, we then have to break the news that despite them having spent hundreds or sometimes thousands of pounds the chances are that the major search engines won't list their sites as they can't read the web code it's made up of and therefore just skips past them - they're not very happy when they hear this.

We then get the job of either trying to back engineer the site to repair it or re-writing the whole thing, don't get me wrong we're happy with the work but it's a bit of a kick in the teeth for the customer having to pay out twice for the same thing.

In the near future we've decided to launch a new site called www.rescueyourwebsite.co.uk where people can come and get a free evaluation of their site, the state of the code, link verification, readability etc. We'll keep the blog updated of it's progress.

In the meantime, give your code the love it deserves.

New SiteChooser Website

2009-07-01T12:37:00.000+01:00

The brand new SiteChooser website is being met with some big thumbs up from previous clients and business contacts. We're now working on the tweaks to make it really stand out from the crowd. First job will be a javascript revolving portfolio to display our previous project work with the aim of attracting new offers. The real work is still coming in too, another two requests this morning - we're going to need more bods at this rate! If anyone out there is interested please forward a CV and a portfolio of your best work to us. Our contact details can be found on our site at www.sitechooser.co.uk. The SEO is coming along as well, article writing and directory submission seems to be half my day right now. All in a good cause. Onwards and upwards.

SiteChooser Relaunched

2009-06-29T15:22:00.001+01:00

At last! SiteChooser is relaunched. We have a brand new website up and running, a few tweaks to be made but fully functional. Now comes the grind, SEO. We're going to get eloquent and wordy for a few weeks and push the site to the top of Google, get inundated with requests to work on high profile projects, expand the business and take over the world.

Please check out the new site at www.sitechooser.co.uk and if you need a website or you need us to work on a graphic design project with you, just give us a call on 0121 707 9998.

Re-vamping the SiteChooser website

2008-10-21T13:31:00.001+01:00

Disaster!! The internet is defunct! Oh well, I'm sure the replacement BT router will solve our problem. Meanwhile I will mostly be thinking about how the childcare and services pages will be looking on our new site. It's progressing nicely and turning into something special. I'll crack on with www.sitechooser.co.uk and keep the internet posted.

Re-vamping the SiteChooser website

2008-10-20T12:08:00.000+01:00

OK. An update. I have just re-jigged the homepage again to make sure that our specialist services are highlighted, those being our school/childcare packages and our small business start-up packages. I am just going to add in some subtle flash movies (just changing/cycling images) to add a bit of interest. Check out www.sitechooser.co.uk to stay up to date with the latest additions and mods.

Re-vamping the www.SiteChooser.com website

2008-10-16T14:33:00.000+01:00

We're a little further on now. The homepage layout is updated and I'm working on the portfolio page with a scrolling image to display all of our latest wonderful work. It will be a splendid thing when complete. Visit www.sitechooser.co.uk in it's current state and witness a miraculous transformation.

Re-vamping the SiteChooser website

2008-10-14T14:48:00.000+01:00

Tuesday 14th October 2008

Right, here goes. I'm re-vamping our website.
The site address is www.sitechooser.co.uk for those who are interested and it's going to be a blinder. Our design service is second to none and so our website will be the best in the industry. That's the aim anyway. Bright, cheerful and yet professional and easy to navigate.
Bring it on.