Posts Tagged ‘Web Management’

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Google Analytics Overhaul

Tuesday, December 13th, 2011

Are you struggling a bit with the new look & features within Google Analytics? Well here are 5 key features that you should start using:

1. Keyword Clouds

If you aren’t familiar with a tag cloud then they provide you with a visual and textual representation of how popular a certain topic is. The bigger the font size, the more popular the topic is. You can now use these clouds to view the keywords visitors are using to access your website.

2. Real-time data

Remember when you used to run log files through an analyser and get yesterdays stats. Event Google delayed stats by up to 24hrs. Now it’s possible to get real time information, very useful for monitoring marketing campaigns

3. Site Speed

A slow site will almost always affect your audience and they will soon leave your site in a cloud of frustration. This new function allows you to keep an eye on the site speed – especially useful when launching new features or during periods of high traffic volume.

4. Flow Visualisation

Whilst the entrance and exit pages were previously available, you can now following the flow of visitors through your website. This can help identify flaws in conversion funnels such as a lengthy basket process or complicated registration forms.

5. Dashboard

You can now create your own custom dashboards providing information that is relevant to you and your measurements. This allows you to create a top level dashboard for the CEO – so he can see all the numbers going in the right direction, and a more detailed view for the Marketing Manager – so he can keep the numbers going in the right direction.

If you have not logged in to Analytics recently (Why Not !!), take a look for yourself – you’ll soon find yourself drifting into the immersive world of website statistics.

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Traffic Traffic everywhere….

Tuesday, May 3rd, 2011

But not a sale in sight !!!

Many clients are often impressed by the level of traffic that their website is receiving. It’s a very similar principal to walking down the high street and seeing  a busy shop. “Wow they must be raking it in”. Well the shop may be busy but how long is the queue at the cash tills? In a nutshell, people may be attracted to go in the front door, but are they buying goods?

The website is no different in this respect; high numbers of visitors do not equate to a high number of sales. So what are some the key barriers which stop your visitors making a purchase?

Navigation – can I find the product I want?

Price – not just the product price, think about the addition of VAT as well as any delivery charges which may be added during the checkout process. How much has that added to the customer’s inital outlay?

Poor Images – would you buy a product if you can’t see it?

Poor Descriptions – I want to know all this product can do for me and if you don’t tell me, Ill go somewhere else. However if you give me too much information which is badly organised, it will be too much to take in and I will go somewhere else. A fine balance – yet a very necessary one.

Stop Asking me Questions – if I have to fill out form after form just to buy a single item, chances are that I will be put off. Imagine just wanting to buy a pint of milk from the supermarket on Christmas Eve with queues stretching as far as the eye can see – just not fun

Attracting the wrong type of customer – if you don’t deliver abroad, the thousands of daily visitors from the USA are just leaving disappointed.

Non existent offers or promotions – make sure all you offer information is up to date. If you have a promotional code offering 20% off, don’t make the customer jump through hoops to get it – or worse find out that it no longer exists

All this information is easily managed via a website statistics package such as Google Analytics. This is free and can be easily installed within in your website by your web developer.

Using tools like these can help you identify areas of the website which require improvement as well as the sections which are working. Do your research before making knee jerk changes to the pages on your website. It’s your website, it’s your business – make sure it’s doing everything for you.

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Posted in Digital Marketing, E-Commerce, Strategy, Uncategorized, Website Design, Website Management | No Comments »

Be careful what appears on your pages

Wednesday, September 1st, 2010

Whilst this story is another show of mob stupidity in reaction to the Pakistan cricket betting scandal and a more shocking example of cruelty towards animals, it does show what can happen when you have adverts running on your website.

Click on the image and then have a look Related Partners section at the bottom of the image. I think you’ll agree it’s a little inappropriate. The lesson here is to double check everything !!!

a page on the telegraph website

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Website Strategy Tips

Friday, July 9th, 2010

1. Have a Plan

Rather than launching in to get a website set up as fast as possible, have a plan that includes what you want to achieve from your website, how you’re going to market it and identifies the people that you will work with.  You’ll need a different plan depending whether the website is the business, like an online store which should be at the hub of your online marketing plan, or if it supports your business, in which case your website is one of many parts of your marketing mix.

2. Allocate a Budget for Online Marketing

The days where simply having a website was enough are long gone. Now, getting a website should be just one step in your ongoing marketing plans. To have an effective website that gets results you need to market it.

This means that you either need the time and skills to market it yourself, or you need to allocate budget to outsource your marketing.

Aim to include a mix of activities like Search Engine Optimisation (SEO), Search Engine Marketing (SEM), Social Media Marketing (SMM), Email Marketing and Blogging.

3. Web Copy Counts… A lot

If you want people to be able to find your website in search engines and then spend time finding out what you have to offer, you need great copy. Using carefully selected keywords in your copy in the right places is a core aspect of optimising your website for search engines.  And if you’re planning to write and share blog articles, your success is all based on valuable content that you’ll create.

Plan your web copy at the same time as you plan your web design and development.

4. Build Your Network

Whether you choose to build a database of email subscribers, a network of followers on Twitter, members of a Facebook group or connections on LinkedIn, have a plan for expanding your network and an easy way for people to connect with you.

If you have an e-newsletter, add the subscribe box to the top right area of your website. If you’re on Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn, add the icons to part of your website that appears on every page, like the right hand column.

5. Be an Active Citizen of the World Wide Web

Think of your website as the hub of everything that goes in and everything that goes out. Aim to build many many high quality links coming in to your website, which is important for your search engine ranking. And likewise, add links out to other websites. This makes you a good web citizen because you’re helping others build inbound links.

 

This article is an excerpt from Grassroots Internet Strategy and the full article can be found here

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Posted in Digital Marketing, Facebook, Search Engine Optimisation, Social Media, Strategy, Website Design, Website Management, twitter | No Comments »

Mayday Mayday, website down

Monday, March 15th, 2010

We are experiencing  problems on our website which is hosted with Plus Net. Despite it being down since Friday afternoon and them having the weekend to fix the problem, it is still not available at the time of writing this article.

How a company the size of Plus Net can plan to upgrade their servers without:

a.  informing their hosting clients about a potential outage and allowing them to make contingency plans – how hard is it to email all with a common courtesy

and

b.  going about this change with what what seems like no contingency plan for any sort of outage such as this.

In this day and age, can a web design and graphic design company afford to be without their website for over 3 days. I would suggest the answer is no.

Problems and unforeseen circumstances do occur in life and in business, but what annoys any customer is the waiting with no contact, no information; apart from a service update page buried in their website and no prior warning communication. Customer service and courtesy can help any company when problems occur – making the customer feel valued can be the difference between a glitch  and a goodbye.

Will we continue with Plus Net – I’ll let you make your mind up on that one.

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