Now that you have a website online it represents a doorway to your business and the services or products you provide, it’s time to make sure you’re on the High Street and not a back alley. The difference between success and failure in any business is making sure the consumers that are looking for your product or service can find you.

SEO (search engine optimization) is the method of improving the quality and amount of traffic to your website. As a part of Internet Marketing, SEO examines what people search for, and how the search engines they use work.  So the real question is how do you get the right visitors to your website? The Answer is SEO (search engine optimization). Here are a few of the benefits of SEO for your business…

• Positive ROI – SEO (search engine optimization) is a long term, strategical marketing investment and solution that will bring you one of the highest Returns On Investment compared to other marketing options.
• Brand Awareness – The importance for any company’s long term success is to ensure a broad awareness of its brand. The larger the web presence, the larger percent of consumer trust your brand.
• Highly Targeted Traffic – SEO can provide laser precision targeting of traffic to your site. Ensuring possible customer, clients and leads are finding your product or service.
• Non-Stop Marketing – Consider the costs of having just one marketing consultant promoting your site online 24 hours a day! Now that would be expensive! SEO resolves this issue for you, as it never stops, nor sleeps.
• Low Cost – Comparatively you will spend much less than other marketing ventures, with a greater return on investment. Unlike PPC (pay per click) advertising, SEO does not stop the minute you stop paying. A good SEO Firm or Consultant will embed your website in the top search results so that when your campaign comes to an end your site will continue to rank highly, with only minimal tune-ups & updates needed occasionally.
• A Website That Works – So many businesses build websites and either assume traffic will come to them, or because it’s what everyone else is doing and is the trend, both are wrong! SEO makes your website work for you! Search Engine Optimization will increase sales, leads and targeted consumer traffic on a regular basis.

With the knowledge and benefits of natural and organic SEO your one step closer to success with your online business. In this hard economy, now is the time to take advantage of search engine optimization.

Mobile app usage continues to reach new highs globally.  On Thursday, the latest data from Flurry Analytics, which tracks more than 110,000 mobile apps on iOS, Android, Windows Phone and Blackberry, showed that approximately 20 million people access mobile applications on an hourly basis between 7:00 a.m. and 11:00 p.m.

Analysis shows that, compared to relative TV viewing and Internet usage, mobile app usage is higher from 6 am to 6 pm,” the Flurry report reads. “And while the relative percentage of television viewers surpasses that of mobile app users during prime-time, mobile app usage continues to climb until 9 pm, exceeding relative Internet usage throughout the prime-time window.”

Mobile consumers are using apps either instead of, or along-side prime-time television and the Internet. In fact, the percentage of relative mobile app usage is greater than that of relative Internet usage every hour of every day.

Flurry estimates that the combined number of active iOS and Android devices in the U.S. is presently somewhere in the neighbourhood of 110 million.

With Google recently acquiring Motorola and Apple gearing up to launch the iPhone 5 this Autumn, these numbers will continue to grow,” the report concludes. “Further, with companies like Amazon pushing harder into tablets with its recently announced Kindle Fire, and companies like Nokia and Microsoft partnering to stay competitive, we can easily imagine a world of mobile apps where it’s prime-time all the time.”

In order to provide this rapidly growing base of mobile web users with an optimal experience, more and more website owners are pursuing mobile web development to ensure that their website is optimized for smartphone display. If the growing number of mobile web users alone isn’t reason enough to convince website owners to embrace the mobile web, there are also a number of advantages worth considering.

Improved User Experience

Mobile websites are specifically designed for handheld devices – nobody wants to browse a desktop website on their smartphone! Research shows that mobile-optimized websites significantly improve user experience and satisfaction, which makes a positive impression when it counts.

Faster Download Speed

Mobile websites are specifically designed for mobile standards and optimal download speed, which means less waiting and more browsing.

Engagement and Context

A mobile website allows you to immediately engage users with mobile-specific features such as click-to-call, mapping functions. Furthermore, if you’re a local business mobile is particularly significant as more and more visitors will find your site through location-aware technology that connects users to your website when they are in immediate geographic proximity.

Improved Search/SEO performance

A mobile website provides improved rankings on mobile-friendly search engines such as Google and Yahoo, and also allows placement in a growing number of mobile and local directories.

Brand Identity

Actions speak louder than words – a mobile website immediately helps you stand out and presents a positive, contemporary brand identity for your organization. A mobile-optimized website makes a positive statement before you’ve said anything.

Portability and Connectivity

A mobile website can be accessed anywhere, any time. This level of constant connectivity provides an unprecedented opportunity to connect with target audiences in new ways, wherever they may be.

Competitive Advantage

A mobile website puts you in a position to stand out among competitors – if your website doesn’t look good on a smartphone users will move on to one that does. A mobile website ensures that you – not your competitors – capture visitor attention while you have it.

Acting as a visual hyper-link to a page, QR codes make it easy to jump someone to a mobile optimized offer page and as such, represent a very powerful tool for initiating consumer engagement at the time when the marketing piece is likely triggering its most emotional response—the impulse moment.

Some recent high-profile campaigns include Billboards by Calvin Klein in Times Square, Starbucks and Lady Gaga teaming up on a QR code driven scavenger hunt.

Have you got any success stories about the use of QR codes within your organisation?

Over the last few years we have spoken to many different organisations regarding employing mobile technology to assist in growing their business.  It has become very clear that there has been a massive shift of recent times in the way people operate.  Where as once upon a time the desktop PC was at the heart of everything online it has now become the tool for carrying out your business, whether that be typing reports, working on spreadsheets or sending emails.

People are now accessing information online via their mobile devices in droves as they can do so at a time that suits them rather than a time they are sat in their office in front of their computer.  A recent survey said that over 60% of people with smartphones access Mobile Apps and Mobile Websites via their mobile device when they are waiting for something.

It is fair to say that we are all very busy people, however we do have pockets of free time throughout our working day when we will browse online.  The challenge is that this free time can often appear when we least expect it so the mobile device is the obvious platform to take advantage of as you carry it with you all the time.

We recently developed a Mobile App for Eric Miltons Jewellers in Liverpool and the App was downloaded over 2000 times to peoples devices within the first week of being available to download, this is further evidence that the world has changed and that mobile technology must be at the heart of your business.

Here are a few interesting stats…

• Android is mostly used by men aged around 30 years.
• iPhones are used equally by men and women in all ages. 50% of all iPhone users buy one or more applications each month.
• iPhone users are very happy with their devices. 91% of all iPhone users would recommend it to others.

We will soon be posting industry specific news and blog articles.