Pay-Per-Click (PPC) advertising is now offered by many of the main search engines and directories but it is Google’s Sponsored Links, more commonly known as PPC, which is by far the most popular.

PPC advertising can be setup relatively quickly and is a great way to gain more visibility for keyword searches aimed at relevant traffic.

The great thing about PPC campaigns is that unlike other forms of advertising you don’t pay to place your advert, only if someone clicks on your advert. This is why it is most important to make your campaigns and chosen keywords as relevant, focused and concise as possible.

With all paid advertising, you are looking for quality not quantity traffic

PPC campaigns allow you to target specific regions and provide a great deal of information to measure campaign performance. As you will only pay once someone clicks on your advert, it is essential that you send them to the correct landing page of your company website; and each page is focussed on selling your products and services.

Here is a list of 10 things you should consider when using PPC campaigns to advertise you company products and services:

1. Create individual PPC campaigns for every product or service
2. Do not link PPC adverts to your Home Page
3. Edit your landing pages to suit your PPC campaigns
4. List specific keywords for each campaign
5. Mirror the keywords in your PPC campaign and your chosen website landing page to improve sales
6. Set a daily budget so as to manage your costs
7. Review your campaigns regularly, daily if possible
8. Use split testing in order to continually improve the adverts
9. Use ‘Phrase’ & ‘Exact’ rather than ‘Broad’ keywords
10. Bid to stay in the top 5 search results

For more free advice on setting up & managing effective PPC campaigns, contact Buzzin Fly.

The Home Page of your business website is the most important page. Think of it as you would the main entrance to your shop or reception to your office. With this in mind consider what you would expect to see in a shop window and the greeting you would be given by a friendly receptionist, and then make a list of things you should include on your Home Page.

There is no perfect website design or layout to follow, and different so-called ‘experts’ will offer different advice. Furthermore, there are no guarantees that will rank your website at #1 in Google or have you double your sales in a week! But if you consider the following points hopefully you will understand the most important elements that go into making a good website Home Page for your business.

Welcome Message

A welcome message can be a short paragraph that immediately tells your visitors who you are and what you do. This needs to be said with a smile but not take up more space than necessary.

Products & Services

Introduce your products and services as this is probably the main reason for your company website. Again, consider the space you are using and whether you are targeting your best customers (those who will spend the most money with you either now or over the course of your business relationship). Where possible use sound bites or tag lines and invite potential customers to make a ‘call to action’. This could be a link to a product page where you have more space to push information to the reader once they have shown an interest in a particular product or service, or open a form for the user to complete.

Prices & Special Offers

If you are selling products or services use your Home Page to highlight your best sellers, current promotions or special offers; and in doing so include some prices so the reader can make an informed decision as to what you are offering and whether it’s within their budget. In short, be proactive in push the information you want the user to read.

Relevant Content

Google’s algorithm for ranking websites is a tightly kept secret but it is common knowledge that Google ranks websites higher which includes a focussed subject matter and relevant content. By writing your copy using a smaller keyword list will help your website become more focussed and specialist. Furthermore, when writing your copy consider both end users and search engines alike; and in doing so reiterate your main keywords where possible.

Regularly Update Content

Google also looks for websites to regularly update its content. As the Home Page is the most important page, you should focus your attention on monthly, if not weekly, changes. This is also good for returning visitors. Regularly updating your special offers and imagery will make your website more “sticky” which will in turn lead to more sales or a call to action from your users.

Design & Layout

Above all, make sure the design and layout gives a good first impression and allows your users to find what they want as easy as possible. Consider using graphics to not only brighten up your design but also to help separate different elements of your Home Page. This in turn will make it easier for someone to focus on each part of the page.

This is just a few points that could make all the difference between users bouncing off your Home Page as soon as it loads or sticking to the Home Page and becoming your next customer.

Most small businesses in the UK are expecting a difficult time in 2011.  The current economic climate is gloomy and isn’t set to change for the foreseeable future.  Being positive and optimistic is part of the trick, but business survival depends on much more besides.

It’s always good to believe your products and services are better than your closest competitors as it is easier to sell something you believe in.  But without an effective sales and marketing strategy your business will not succeed.

Here are a few suggestions of how you might be able to boost sales in 2011

Sell to existing customers

You’ve probably read this before but it’s the most common mistake businesses of all sizes make.  Businesses are so busy focussing on bringing in new business they neglect ‘quiet’ customers.  But selling to existing customers is so much less time consuming than finding new ones; and time is money, especially when you haven’t got any!

Getting new customers should always be part of your sales & marketing plan if you want your business to grow but too many small businesses ignore or forget about existing customers and in doing so are missing out on quick and easy up sell.

Get old customers back

Similarly, you can contact old customers who for whatever reason have stopped buying from you.  Find out why they are not using your business anymore and offer them incentives to come back to you.  Again, this is a much quicker process than contacting a new customer as you will already have contact details to hand.

You may be surprised to find that some customers simply drifted away rather than decided not to use your company for a reason.

Sell to new customers

If you are looking to increase your client base the first thing to consider is whether you want to target more clients with the products and services you already offer or if you want to move into new areas.  There is an obvious risk and cost to the latter but it is worth your consideration.

Before rushing in to any new sales campaign, start with a brainstorming session to create a list of ways to attract new customers.  For best results, sit as part of a group rather than alone.  You can start your list with the following example:

Ask your current customers to refer your products & services to their own clients and contacts by offering a discount on their next invoice.

This way you will only pay out if you receive more work.

And remember, it is not the business with the best products and services but those with the best sales and marketing strategies that will continue business growth, especially in these difficult economic  times.

Buzzin Fly specialises in helping small business to be successful by using the internet and the world wide web.  We have 13 years experience providing successful web development and internet marketing services. Our aim is to build strong relationships with clients who see the benefits of using the internet as a marketing tool.

In the current economic climate you may have found customers are even more concerned with price.  In some industries you may already be competing on price whereas in my business I have always concentrated on service and quality over price.  But right now it is more essential than ever before to be seen to offer potential customers cut prices, if you are hungry for a sale.  So here are 5 ways to increase your sales without cutting your prices.

1.    Add-ons – create a product that sells for double the price of the original product but offers to save the customer money.  For example if you sell digital SLR cameras then make a package deal that includes the camera + a book on how to use the camera, a carry case, an extra memory stick, an extra lens.  By adding the extras you can make more money by upselling, offering a discounted “package deal”.

2.    Free Gifts – offering a free product or service can entice new customers.  You can promote a ‘buy two get one free’ or you can offer a free related service when you buy another one.  If you run a garage you can offer a free MOT with every full service.  The cost of an extra full car service should be enough to allow you to still make a profit; and if you give a good customer service there will always the chance of retaining that custom, long term.

3.    Loyalty Cards – by offering existing customers points or vouchers to spend on other services they are inclined to shop more regularly with you.  For example, offer points or vouchers whenever they spend with you and even offer a discount when they have accumulated a certain amount of points.  My son has a loyalty card where he receives points for every pound he spends in a well known computer games shop.  He is sensible with his money, though feels compelled to buy new games from the high street shop to gain extra points that he can put towards a new game, even when he can buy the game for slightly less online.

4.    Premium Version – Even in such hard times there will always be a small percentage of customers that are not buying your products or services on price alone.  But will be more concerned for one reason or another to be receiving the best you have to offer.  For example if you develop a website complete with a Content Management System (CMS) you might offer a ‘Gold Service’ whereby you offer to manage to website and keep the site up to date for any busy clients.

5.    10% Discount for Referrals – By offering existing customers an incentive to promote your products and services to their own customers and contacts, you will be receiving more enquiries without spending time looking for them, and if you offer an existing customer 10% off their next invoice for a new sale lead they will also have an incentive to spend more money with you.

Social media is media that makes use of social interaction & uses accessible & interactive publishing techniques, allowing users (or readers) of a tool to interact with the content rather than simply read static content. This can be achieved by adding ‘Comments’ to blogs and YouTube videos & ‘Re-tweeting’ (passing on) Twitter posts. This is different to websites that simply transmit news.

The content can then be passed around in much the same way as viral marketing whereby you allow others to help promote your business.

Social Media is a new way to market business products & services online. It should be used alongside traditional offline marketing and other online marketing such as a company website.

There are plenty of social media tools to use, all of which will help to promote your business but there are certain things to consider. The main points being:

• Spend time building up your followers/ readers

• Do not try to oversell your company

• Be seen to be giving useful content for free

More so with social media than other ways of marketing, you need to ‘get involved’ with the medium and devote time interacting and regularly updating social media accounts to make them work for you.

Blogging needs regular interesting posts that will engage a target audience. I recommend a minimum of one post per week & not more than one per day, unless the information is time critical.

There are many of social media tools to use but never start using a new one. Always wait to see how popular a tool is & gauge whether it is right for you & engages your target audience.

If you are not sure which social media tools to start using or your time is limited, I would recommend you start by setting up Facebook & Twitter accounts and, if you have interesting video content or the budget to produce it, a YouTube channel too.

As for blogging, you can setup a company blog. But it would also be beneficial to consider publishing articles on other popular blogs that are popular with your target audience; and to consider not only banner advertising but articles of interest written in such a way to include links back to your website or blog, rather than wanting other blogs to simply write an advertorial about your products & services.

For example, to attract football fans during this summer’s World Cup in South Africa, Domino Pizza created free football related games & added them to a Facebook page. They then asked had Buzzin Media write & publish a football related article including relevant backlinks to their website & their Facebook page. See

By doing so, readers of Buzzin Football were more inclined to click on the links within a football post than click on a peripheral banner advertisement.

The main thing to consider is that all social media requires ongoing management. This is a service we can offer you or advice you on. But remember, don’t just dip your toes & expect miracles. This may take time but the effort will be worth it.

Buzzin Fly is an internet marketing & website development company
www.buzzinfly.co.uk

Buzzin Media is a UK based blog network. We currently have 32 popular blog titles covering business, entertainment & sport
www.buzzinmedia.co.uk

WHAT IS A BLOG?

Blogs started life as simple personal online diaries known as ‘web logs’ which became abbreviated to ‘blogs’. For the past few years blogging has now become an integral part of any business online marketing mix and in the process become a very useful business marketing tool.

BLOGS versus WEBSITES

More companies are now considering using WordPress and other blog software to develop their company website. This raises both positive and negative issues. Positive as blogs publish ‘posts’ by using “push technology” that sends your website updates to the search engines for immediate online publication. But using WordPress, or any ‘off-the-shelf’ solution for that matter can be troublesome if you are looking for advance bespoke functionality.

A blog can therefore be a website but a website cannot easily act like a blog, without development time running so high that it is unproductive to do so. The current Buzzin Fly website is an example of how you can make use of WordPress blog technology to power a company website.

WHAT DOES A BLOG INCLUDE?

Generally speaking, blogs tend to have a few things in common:

• Content written about a specific subject

• Specific content = relevant keyword rich pages

• Each ‘POST’ indexed as an individual pages with its own keywords

• Blog posts include in-context ‘textlinks’ which is the most powerful way of advertising your business

• A list of “useful links” known as a ‘blogroll’

• Allow readers to publish their comments to your site, making it truly interactive – in the process updating the content

• Allow other sites to use content via an RSS Feed (Good content will be promoted by others similarly to viral marketing)

• Regularly updated relevant, well-written content

IMPORTANT POINT

All the above mean that Google loves blogs more than websites & accredit them accordingly!

CORPORATE BLOGGING

When writing for a blog about your business be careful not to oversell your products & services. Be transparent and open, & do not attempt to overly censor negative comments. By answering comments you are engaging with potential customers.

SETTING UP YOUR OWN BLOG

When setting up your own blog consider the following points:

• How interesting is the subject?

• How many readers will you attract?

• How much material can you write?

• How much time can you spend on not only writing for, but managing a blog?

• What shall I blog about?

• Offer good free advice

• Be opinionated

• Engage your readers & invite comments by ending on a question

Alternatively, if you don’t think you have enough content or time….

Be a guest blogger for popular blogs with a good Google ranking such as Buzzin Media or pay for others to write articles with backlinks to your company website.

HOW USING BLOGS IS A GOOD WAY TO PROMOTE YOUR BUSINESS

• Advertising Opportunities - banner advertising, textlinks, advertorials

• One Way Links from highly relevant sources

• Increased traffic = more potential customers

• Increased visibility

• Higher ranking in Google and other search engines

So, considering all the ways in which a blog can help promote your business & how blogs work so well with Google you now need to consider how much potential business you are missing.

Pay per click (PPC) advertising is less commonly known as sponsored links, sponsored adverts and Cost per click (CPC).  It is an excellent way to place your adverts on the first page of most popular search engines such as Google, Yahoo and Live!

What is Pay Per Click (PPC) Advertising?

Pay per click or PPC is a way of advertising online whereby you only pay a publisher when someone clicks on your link. Generally, you do not pay to place the advert.

PPC advertising allows you to target quality traffic rather than quantity by only appearing in a search results list if it matches a search phrase or keyword.  This way of targeted marketing is very useful but can be costly and a waste of time unless the PPC campaigns are setup correctly in the first instance.

PPC advertising is most commonly found on search engines, and as the most popular search engine on the planet the best place to start your PPC advertising is with Google. But be careful.  Whereas Google suggest setting up your own campaigns is a very simple process, they fail to explain that to maximise your profits and return on investment (ROI) PPC campaigns are best setup by someone with both experience and the time to manage them.

Here at Buzzin Fly we have had many calls from businesses large and small who have been duped into thinking setting up a successful PPC campaign will be quick and simple.  Only to find little or in most cases, no new business before or after they pay Google a big fat cheque for the cost of several hundred or thousand clicks!

The truth is it is very easier to get quantity traffic to your website via paid advertising.  But it isn’t quantity traffic you are need.  It’s quality traffic, potential customers who because their search matches your campaign search terms offers a greater potential for a sale.

Google’s PPC advertising is called Google AdWords.  This system is more advanced than most.  Better to work with if you have experience, harder to get right if you haven’t as there is more functionality and ways to maximise your campaigns.

The most common mistake we see is where a company has decided to setup its own PPC campaigns in Google AdWords using Broad Match search rules only.  There are three ways to add keywords to your campaigns: Broad Match, Phrase Match and Exact Match.

If one of the keywords you wish to be listed for has more than one word, internet marketing, for example then a broad match could show your advert for both or either of those keywords.  A Phrase Search requires the person searching to include both words in the correct order, but the search can include other words too.  For example, internet marking in the uk.  The third and best way to attract quality traffic through a PPC campaign is to use an Exact Match.  For your advert to appear the keyword phrase has to match the search term exactly.

Just armed with simple information it is easy to understand that an Exact Match will offer less “clicks” but the highest sales potential; whereas a Broad Match will bring you the most traffic but with less potential for a sale.

This is by far the most common mistake made by companies attempting to save money by setting up a PPC campaign themselves instead of outsourcing the work to experience internet marketing professionals like Buzzin Fly.

There are plenty of other things to consider when using PPC advertising that will take up your valuable time.  So why not contact us now and let us manage a successful PPC campaign for you, allowing you the time to manage your business.

What is breadcrumb navigation?

Breadcrumb navigation is a way of showing the path a visitor has taken through a website.  Each page that is visited is shown as a text link.  The breadcrumb “trail” is commonly shown at or near the top of the page.  See Midkent.ac.uk as an example.

Just below the main horizontal navigation bar the breadcrumb trail shows the visitor has viewed three pages: Home, About Us and Medway Campus.  Each one of these can be a text link, allowing the visitor to retrace their steps.

Why has breadcrumb navigation just become even more important?

Including a breadcrumb trail has always been seen as a value added function.  Good for usability and simpler navigation purposes.  Both are true.  But breadcrumb navigation just got a whole lot more important to every company website who understands the importance of ticking every box specific to how Google eventually ranks your website.

Google is to place importance on breadcrumb navigation

Google has decided it is going to change the way they display search engine results.  To make search result links more user friendly they are going to list the name of the actual page you are about to click to view.

So, instead of the MidKent College page example we used earlier being listed as: http://www.midkent.ac.uk/about-us/new-medway-campus it is now going to be shown using the breadcrumb trail navigation: midkent.ac.uk/ About Us > Medway Campus.

Not only is the link itself more user friendly and simple to read, Google are about to reward websites that employ breadcrumb navigation, too.

So if your business website doesn’t already use a breadcrumb trail to help your website visitors, contact Buzzin Fly now on 01634 322 721 and let us help you gain valuable search engine ranking over your competitors.

Last year, more money was spent on the internet than in High Street shops in the lead up to Christmas, and the forecast this year is that even more spending will be conducted from the comfort and warmth of customers homes and offices.  And in the process they will be avoiding queues, traffic jams and that ubiquitous last minute rush, let alone the cold north wind!

But whether your business needs an online shop to sell products and services 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year or you need to use a website to promote your company, a website is most definitely not just for Christmas!

And here’s 10 reasons why your business needs a company website.

10 Reasons Why a Company Website Could Help Promote Your Business

1. A company website helps to clarify your products and services and promote your business to potential customers.

2. A company website makes it easier for potential customers to contact you.  Be sure to include a call to action, such as your telephone number, on every page.

3. A company website can be used to attract customers by offering free advice, free information and free give-aways such as an e-book or downloadable PDF. Apparently 61% of people using the internet are searching for information.  If your website ranks high in the major search engines and is seen to be giving away useful free advice, you will be seen as experts in your field.

4. A company website allows potential customers to feel in control of viewing your products and services rather than being confronted by a ‘pushy’ salesman which may turn them away.

5.  A company website allows visitors and customers alike to shop and return at a time that’s convenient for them. This is why online shopping has become so popular in the lead up to Christmas.

6. Unlike a catalogue, brochure or a traditional media advertisment, a company website can be regularly updated.  New products and special offers can be frequently updated to attract more customers.

7. Visitors to your website can leave their contact details and receive a free email newsletter, allowing you to be more proactive by using ‘push marketing’ techniques.

8. Website traffic analysis can tell you which product pages and offers are most popular and those that aren’t, allowing you to tailor your products and services to your target audience.

9.  An online e-commerce solution will allow you to sell your products and make money even when you are asleep!

10.  A company website allows you to set up a program to allow affiliates to sell your products for you.

So if you are looking to promote your business online in 2010 or your current company website is not working for you, please contact me on +44 (0)1634 322 721 or email web-info@buzzinfly.co.uk and I will be full of Christmas spirit (not literally) and only too willing to give you some free advice on how a company website can promote your business in 2010.

Happy Christmas and a Propserous New Year from all of us at Buzzin Fly!

When building a database-driven website there is plenty of things to consider but the loading speed of a website can lose your business traffic as well as ranking with Google.

That’s right, Google rewards good quality, relevant, authoritative fast websites. So it is essential that your website developers use industry standards compliant code that loads pages a speedily as possible.

A recent survey from WebCop show that 52% of your website visitors will not wait too long for your website to load. And the same survey also revealed that a large majority of business owners believe their websites loaded fast enough.

In the current economic climate it is imperative for every business to make sure their company website gives the right first impression, including a professional look, great functionality and pages that load quickly to keep the attention of its visitors.

Most businesses in the UK are now familiar with the importance of ranking high in Google and the other main search engines and therefore losing website visitors, and potential customers so cheaply is inexcusable.

• 52% of people click away from websites because they’re too slow

• 91% of website owners however, believe their site is fast enough

• 54% of website owners are unaware that Google rewards faster websites

That’s why Buzzin Fly uses MySQL database and PHP programming language by choice. It is powerful and secure, yet builds functionality with less code allowing pages to load much quicker than other similar databases and programming languages.

If developed correctly, MySQL and PHP, along with the valuable use of Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) will give you a faster, more successful company website that not only attracts web traffic, but keeps visitors longer.

If your web stats show traffic is getting no further than the first page of your website, you consider your website to be too slow or have received feedback to suggest this, then contact us now and let Buzzin Fly help make your website work for you.