Online Marketing

Ok great, so you have a brand new website for your business. It's a common misconception that once you have a website, that's it, the phone will ring - not the case unfortunately in most cases.

As a general rule a website will not generate business unless it is marketed. There are of course many ways of marketing your website and the most common would typically include printing your domain name on business stationery, business cards and flyers as well as including it in business listings and directories. This may generate you a little business but to be really effective and to increase your reach substantially you need to look at other areas - both online as well as offline. Here will will introduce to you the two main broad areas of online marketing - Search Engine Optimisation and Pay Per Click Advertising.

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)

Over the years, search engine optimisation was always seen as a dark art but more and more people are becoming aware of it's importance and the pivotal role that search engine optimisation plays in ensuring your website is visible. As it sounds, the process involves optimising your website for the search engines. The search engines regularly scan or spider all websites in order to register its content and to put the information it finds into its 'data cache' - here it will store your website data until it searches and scans again typically two weeks later.

When a user searches in Google for example, Google will display those websites that it deems to be the most appropriate to the search term that the user used. Google bases the decision on which websites to display on many many factors BUT primarily on the content and relevancy of it.

After reading this you should realise that your 'content' is therefore a very important factor in web design. Indeed it is the most important factor. There are lots of other factors that come to play but here we are focusing on the basics - the basics will ensure your website has a good chance of success without spending a small fortune on advanced optimisation.

The results from optimising your website typically take quite a long time to take effect, usually from several weeks to a year depending on the product / industry and its competitiveness. So how can we help?...

ALL our websites are built to be search engine friendly and even our budget websites come with some free optimisation techniques to help ensure the success of your website. See each section to what is included and what are the options with each package; Budget Web Design | Advanced Web Design | Database Websites

Pay Per Click (PPC)

Pay per click advertising, sometimes referred to as 'Cost per click', 'PPC', 'CPC', or 'Sponsored ads' is a great way of bringing your website in front of your customers quickly. Because SEO work typically takes at the very least a month or two, but often much longer, PPC is effective in that it can be set up and operational in a matter of hours / days depending on the nature of the product and size of the campaign.

How does PPC work? In Google you see search results on the left and on the right. Those on the right (as well as the sponsored links at the very top left) are paid for ads. The results on the left are the 'natural results' that cannot be paid for - positions here are only attained through optimisation.

Once set up, your specifically written ads will appear on the right when a customer searches for your product / service, providing you use the correct keywords. When a searcher clicks on your ad, they are directed to your website and you are charged for the click. The cost per click varies immensely subject to your product and its competitiveness. Whether your potential customers click on your ad is dependent on many factors but we can take care of all this for you and generate vistors to your site in no time! It is important that your PPC campaign is set up accurately and effectively to minismise your advertising spend.

We hope the above clarifies the distinction between the 'natural' results / SEO and paid for advertising or PPC. We will be delighted to discuss your needs so please do not hesitate to contact us and we will call you back and advise accordingly.