Only send out the really good stuff
What do you think your prospects and customers think of the emails you've sent?
Business Marketing Online
Should I bid on my competitors’ brand names?
There are pros and cons to doing this, although (spoiler alert), we usually recommend against it.
Why you should set up some ‘audiences’ today
If you want to run a 'remarketing' advertising campaign, you'll need an 'audience' to advertise to
You haven’t missed the boat with content marketing
Many companies are using content marketing techniques without realising
When the description meta tag comes to our rescue
The less content there is on a page, the more important the description meta tag
In search ranking, context is everything
Sometimes you have to scroll down to find the top natural result!
Analyse your website for best practices with Google
By following the explanatory links, you might learn something interesting
Making a YouTube video ‘thumbnail’ that gets noticed
If you're not a Photoshop wizard, there are online tools which make it simple.
Descriptions: a way to make your videos work harder
As with the thumbnails, this can be done retrospectively to existing videos.
ICYMI – All the blog posts from November 2018
Our monthly listing of everything which has been in the blog in the last month...
They have your best interests at heart
Only half as many people who agree that (these strategies) work, actually do them
Does a mention without a link still have SEO value?
We shouldn't be surprised if journalists see providing links as something to avoid
Why advertising your videos is great value
You can get hundreds of extra views of a video each month for £1 a day
New website? Create a brief but make it brief
You'll need a short brief, so that they're all quoting for the same thing
Why SEO should cost serious money
This is the sort of thing which top SEO consultants can do for big companies
How to create great content with how-to content
"How To" content takes a little bit of effort to set up, but it's incredibly productive, helping existing users and attracting prospects.
The daily grind of changes to Google Ads
Obviously if you run your own Google Ads campaigns you'll want to keep up with all this
Has anyone copied your content online?
Does it matter? If the site has been 'scraped' for no apparent reason, probably not.
Domain name registration: 1 year or forever?
If you want to help ensure you never lose your domain name, pay for a decent length of registration (e.g. 10 years)
Time for an early Christmas present
I'm pretty certain that "This is Marketing: You Can’t Be Seen Until You Learn To See" will be worth reading
In SEO as in so much else, size isn’t everything
If you're trying to rank for something obscure, your competition may be negligible
How pay-per-click advertising has revolutionised the industry
I don't suppose I need to convince many of the readers of this blog of the advantages of PPC search advertising.
Make sure you have an up-to-date Google My Business account
Google is adding new features all the time, which you need to take advantage of
What does your business look like on Google Maps?
I think it's more important than ever to ensure your company is properly listed and described in Google Maps
How do we improve Quality Score for a keyword?
In a classic example of '80/20', the problem is easier to work on than you think
Are Business Directories still relevant in 2018-19?
If you think the traffic is worth the money, go ahead and re-book.
ICYMI – All the blog posts from October 2018
Our monthly listing of everything which has been in the blog in the last month...
Your Google results have to work really hard
The page title which is displayed needs to be written with all the care you'd put into an advert
Don’t send your best advert responders to ordinary pages
But wait a minute: why do we have to do it for every product?
The increasing need for both quantity and quality
Of course, creating a 2,000 word article isn't easy
Subject lines are more important than ever
I try to write them short enough to appear on most desktop PC screens
Don’t get carried away with ad extensions
The display of some of these extensions is starting to look really tatty
How to brief a writer for your website
Give them a steer in the right direction – they'll thank you for it
Should I drop the ‘www’ from my website?
It's perfectly possible to have our entire website at the 'root domain' level
All about redirects and deleting pages
If you're removing a page from your website, you should set up a 301 redirect
Spotting your Google results which aren’t delivering
As is so often the case, Google Search Console is our friend
Getting prospects the answers they need (2)
Email can be done through web forms, but few of us trust these
Getting prospects the answers they need (1)
It would be criminal to lose someone who's that close to contacting you
Google favours pages which change with the times
There's a lot to be gained by regularly adding and updating them
Should I have an online store?
They were also convinced that they'd got many more new clients who found the company through the store
Get your search right or don’t have it at all
Your site search has to deliver results to the standard that people expect
Why it’s good to get in character
As soon as several people contribute, you need some sort of policy.
ICYMI – All the blog posts from September 2018
Our monthly listing of everything which has been in the blog in the last month...
Let’s see if your website really does its job
If your page doesn't pass both tests, resolve to do something about it
The critical signal to the visitor
It's criminal to then risk them clicking 'back' while the page loads because it looks like nothing's happening
The only thing that matters in advertising
The better ad services, led by Google, have sophisticated ways of identifying and discounting it
No takers to write an article? No problem.
How do you get it out, efficiently, short of a hot-wire to their brains?
Having the courage to look at the numbers that matter
How many marketing managers are going to ignore the opportunity to present such a lovely rising graph?
SEO: how it all adds up
SEO is now so complex that it's almost impossible to define a set of generalised tactics
What else can you get out of those case studies?
I think that our client had just not put two and two together
The long tail of exact match search advertising
It would be nice to know what these searches were. But unfortunately, until you get a click, you're not going to find out.
Don’t compromise the design of your landing pages
You need a special system just for landing pages, even if it does force you to opt out of your normal content management system
Contact Who?
If you can also use that drop-down to send emails to the right person directly, even better; everyone gains
Why we avoid the Display Network and apps on mobile devices
If we use the Display Network at all, we switch off all appearances on mobile devices
More on those new Responsive Search Ads
Keep one or more of your standard text adverts running alongside any Responsive Search Ads for now
Description meta tags – do make some effort
Can I suggest that you at least write good page descriptions for your most important pages?
New search ad format may provide better matching
We've had the opportunity to test them, and they're very interesting.
ICYMI – All the blog posts from August 2018
Our monthly listing of everything which has been in the blog in the last month...
Put in the effort for best search quality
A page can be considered low quality even if its intention is good.
Image formats continue to evolve
It's quite possible that one of the site's recommended alternative formats will be WebP
How to stop advertisers from wasting their money
So we thought: 'Why not call the advertisers and let them know?'
Buying an email list is a terrible idea
Just who are these people who've said "you can sell my email address to unknown manufacturers"?
Talking about Google My Business
If you want to get more confident with your account, spend some time on the Official Google My Business Community
Don’t be pressured into neglecting results
Pushing stuff into the system has to be done, but it's not everything.
Why you should renew your efforts to get ‘featured snippets’
Most people's first question is: can I really get these?
How are searches on your company name looking?
The best line of attack may be to spend a few pounds on a search advertising campaign
Inspiration to get better conversion rates
It shows how much website traffic can be worth if you can turn visitors into customers.
Guidelines for giving a good presentation
I think there's no substitute for creating three separate, parallel presentations.
The drawbacks of your ‘hamburger menu’
You need to remember that nobody knows what it contains until they click on it, and why should they?
Have a think about reorganising your navigation
This common error means that a great opportunity - to list what you sell - is missed
Branding is about what people associate with your name
'Branding' is often considered to be bit of an extravagance in industrial marketing.
Can you inherit content from other sites?
If you come across good content on other sites which is neglected, try to get ownership of it
ICYMI – All the blog posts from July 2018
Our monthly listing of everything which has been in the blog in the last month...
How long is long enough?
Does your 500-word article stand no chance? Would a 5000-word article be better?
Could you do more with personalisation?
Your website developer may be able to do more than you think
HTML5 is the way to go
There are a number of HTML5 editors around, and it's worth learning how to use one
Fine-tuning where search engine traffic arrives
Are there some obscure old products or even PDF documents showing?
Are you missing out from the start?
There's no substitute for putting yourself in the place of a prospect, and searching online to see what they see.
It’s time to set any remaining gated content free
Genuine prospects will contact you without you needing to contact them.
Getting that video to work for you in search
Half a dozen things to think about when you put a video on YouTube.
What sort of question makes people want to click?
An understanding of this is why so many article headlines are annoyingly compelling
Pre-header text: a quick win on marketing emails
If you can set the pre-header in your mailing software, do take the opportunity
Letting Google know your site is the original
What can be done about this sort of thing? Very little, unfortunately.
Don’t take your best features for granted
It's worth trying to figure out everything that makes your company unique
Manufacturing sector sticks to its PCs for email
In nearly all business sectors, 50–60% of emails are opened on mobile devices
How do I remove a page from the Google results?
There's a Google tool for removing pages, as part of Search Console
Internal links do matter
Your new pages could really use some link equity passed on from those old ones
A literal snapshot of Google results
If you want historic data, you'll need to compile your own archive by taking screenshots
Cheap SEO is simply throwing away money
If you're paying a consultant £200 a month, you're getting 1 hour a week of their time at most
ICYMI – All the blog posts from June 2018
Our monthly listing of everything which has been in the blog in the last month...
Online articles aren’t fixed in time
You may be sitting on something just ready to take off, without knowing it
What does your site look like in the Nintendo browser?
You'll find people are viewing your web site through all sorts of wonderful apps
LinkedIn – a neglected free marketing opportunity
LinkedIn is a social network too, and it's one which is more important to most of us in business
Google Sites – a real time-saver for something temporary
As a quick way of building websites, the new Google Sites is very impressive
Google’s ‘Display Network’ needn’t be overwhelming
We like to start by advertising on known sites, and/or advertising to known people.
Time to have a spring-clean of your page titles
Maybe it's time to check your page titles are really working efficiently for you
Don’t be put off online display advertising
Getting equivalent coverage to a print advert from website adverts requires huge exposure.
Google descriptions drop back to two lines (aargh!)
We are indeed permanently back to descriptions of a maximum 155-160 characters
Are you measuring views of PDF documents?
Few companies' analytics reports have any record of visitors attempting to look at PDF documents
How many links should my marketing emails have?
Of course, there's no straight answer, but there are couple of considerations
Don’t worry about duplicating your own content
The days when legitimate sites got poor rankings because they repeated their own content are long gone
Make sure it’s the right person
If you write with a specific person in mind, your writing should be that much more engaging
ICYMI – All the blog posts from May 2018
Our monthly listing of everything which has been in the blog in the last month...
How your website looks on mobile devices
If you don't have a phone of that size to hand, you can simulate what happens in your desktop browser
PDF documents and the mobile experience
Reading PDF A4 documents on a mobile phone varies from irritatingly awkward to just about impossible
Get the message about trust over quickly
The most reassuring thing for prospects is to see that you have other customers
Make your shoppers feel at home
They're going to feel a lot more comfortable once you've welcomed them properly
Should I be doing search advertising on Bing?
Opening up a Bing Ads account isn't too arduous - give it some thought
Put anything that interests you into a Google Alert
I have dozens of things which Google faithfully checks for me every day
People do love their KPIs
What is a reasonable concept in theory has been made into a monster in practice
What’s making that web page actually work?
You can see the HTML code behind any web page by 'viewing the source' in your browser
Why shortform URLs can sometimes be essential
Getting people to type in a complicated URL is almost impossible.
Getting hourly visit data from Google Analytics
Google Analytics hides away the hourly data, but it's all there
Is your website’s styling working against you?
Try the same for your own website. What's the first thing you look at?
Why are they reading this page in the first place?
Consider the page in terms of what question it might be answering.
GDPR: Think about whether you actually need to refresh consent
We’ve heard stories of email inboxes bursting with emails asking people if they’re still happy to hear from them
Use Google’s knowledge to your advantage
If you're targeting quality visits over quantity, this could be a better bet.
Finding keywords to prioritise for improvement
The data was all there, we just had to know where to look.
ICYMI – All the blog posts from April 2018
Our monthly listing of everything which has been in the blog in the last month...
How much does agency AdWords management cost?
If you use BMON or another agency, feel free to compare our charges here
About the GDPR Balancing Test for Legitimate Interest
The GDPR clearly says that direct marketing is a legal reason for using data.
What to do about data retention in Google Analytics
The main thing to know is that aggregate data will be unaffected
Can we continue to email everyone in our database?
Whatever you decide, write all this down as a policy document
What is a sitemap and do I need one?
It's one of the first things any search engine web crawler looks for when it arrives at your site
Help – I can’t put anything on my own website
For those of you who read this blog despite being unable to action almost anything that gets discussed, I salute you
Ensuring ‘About Us’ is ‘Why Us’
Does your 'About Us' page deliver in that respect, attractively and concisely?
Making opening that email seem like a good deal
It's unlikely that any of our company names will generate that sort of 'must read' enthusiasm from our customers
What’s Google actually evaluating your site on?
If it's not responsive, then you definitely need a redesign.
Will access to ‘Dot EU’ domain names be taken away?
It's quite possible that many owners won't wait around to find out.
ICYMI – All the blog posts from March 2018
Our monthly listing of everything which has been in the blog in the last month...
Writing A Great SEO Headline – An Expert Explains
I'd bet that every single business I know could write a hundred of these
Being smart enough to learn from the winners
Observing the competition can provide you with some great ideas
Delivering what they’re looking for
One of the things which running search advertising over the years has taught me is consistency of message
How many links should a company’s home page have?
I'd bet your website designer could strip out a lot of unnecessary junk in 20 minutes
The most cost effective marketing you can do at the moment
I think my top tip at the moment would be to set up a video creation programme
Borrowing pictures can be costly
All of which is a long way round to telling you about a legal difficulty which someone I know has just encountered
Advertising to get previously interested visitors back
Once they've visited your site, they'll keep on seeing you at the top of searches.
Email: the best way to flag up website changes
All you need for this is a website which creates an RSS feed
There’s nothing wrong with a good roundup article
Why not dissect the points and create a new, more comprehensive article?
Tidying up the Pages Viewed reports in Google Analytics
As with so much, I often set up a 'Test' View in Google Analytics to try these things out
Should we worry about Chrome browser ad blocking?
What Chrome blocks is the type of advert that annoys people
Don’t panic over Google Search Console messages
Remember that these things are all automated ...it might not be the end of the world.
Google Search Console’s new Performance Status Report
Have a play – I think you'll find something fascinating in there.
People also search for… an opportunity?
I think it will divert some people away from the next result down, persuading them to try a different search instead.
Another tedious reminder to focus on the prospect
Supporting information is a nice extra to bring in later
ICYMI – All the blog posts from February 2018
Our monthly listing of everything which has been in the blog in the last month...
Don’t lose your best inbound links
I like to check if any links have been lost in the previous 12 months
Google gives the official line on ‘featured snippets’
The spread of these snippets is in preparation for an expected explosion in spoken queries
A Complete Guide To Creating Engineering Data Sheets
For many marketing managers, producing product data sheets is a major responsibility
All about deducing the searcher’s intent
Google understands the intent of pages much better than it ever did
Ranking the links to you and your competitors
BMON's new weekly SEO reports will roll out in the next few weeks
What CTR will I get from a Google results page?
It really is worth identifying where your average position is around 12
The next step from stating the benefits
Too often, the sales support material provided by a company does not help
SEO: your successors will thank you
If you're still around in 2028, you'll be very grateful you began to make the effort in 2018
Don’t waste what you know about your prospects
Think about how you might use that information to tailor the content smartly
Videos for better product photography
If you want to learn more, here's a great set of video tutorials
Why aren’t we all recording web traffic from emails?
Don't forget to apply it to emails that other people are sending out too.
Could LinkedIn make Bing more interesting?
It might be something which we're willing to pay a premium for
ICYMI – All the blog posts from January 2018
Our monthly listing of everything which has been in the blog in the last month...
Sorry AdWords, you do things the wrong way around
I've always believed this is entirely the wrong way around.
Why you need HTML versions of PDF documents
Include PDF documents on your website... but the content should also be displayed as a web page
Making the ‘About Us’ page more dynamic
Why not use the actual text on the page to tell them about the latest thing you're up to?
AdWords ads get decluttered …a little
I rarely saw it used in advertising engineering or scientific B2B suppliers
Don’t overpay for your website hosting
Good web hosts can offer pretty decent support nowadays even for a £5–£10 a month customer
Monitoring PPC advertising beyond the keyword
We've found that image ads on mobile devices are poor value
Underestimating the impact of a single video view
Then they thought again about the minimal cost involved
Why aren’t you photographing everything?
I'm astonished at how many industrial websites I see where the only product image is a horrid cutout.
New longer descriptions in Google: what should we do?
Get that description updated, getting as many of the highlighted search terms in as possible
Crying foul on Google’s new extended descriptions
If you've only provided a short description meta tag and Google thinks it's fine, that's all you get
It’s all about content
Even small companies should be adding several pages every month to their websites
What do you want to know about your visitors?
You can almost certainly measure anything on your website
Don’t give Google search credit where it’s not due
So when you look at your website analytics, be careful
Why we should view Google search as just another website
Be smart with your effort and budget, and know what to focus on and when to walk away
ICYMI – All the blog posts from December 2017
Our monthly listing of everything which has been in the blog in the last month...
Amazon is not just for Christmas
Plenty of businesses no longer even see or touch the products they sell
Why you need to be firm with website stylists
Recognise when they're doing something just because they can
Why I dislike standalone websites more than ever
I'd still argue that it's best for SEO and business in general to keep all your company's assets on one domain.
Your site needs an RSS feed. Does it have one?
I want to ensure you're all producing an RSS feed from your website
What do search results look like in other places?
Spoofing Google to see what its results look in other places can be a useful exercise.
Why and how to transcribe audio or video recordings
If you're really lucky, you can just throw the recording at a free service
Emailing that contact without the email address
Ever spent some time searching online for someone's email?
Who’s been looking at your website stats?
Look at the user list, and ensure that you know who everyone is
Promotion Extensions add to AdWords options
Early reports suggest these extensions are very effective
The adverts that cost you nothing
People prefer to click on natural search results from companies they've heard of
Working hard in SEO, just to stand still
There are two conclusions to draw for your search engine marketing in 2018
Solving the https to http referrer problem in Google Analytics
Unfortunately, the two actions you can take both need to take place at the originating site
ICYMI – All the blog posts from November 2017
Our monthly listing of everything which has been in the blog in the last month...
What are your competitors up to?
Keeping tabs on what other people are doing can reveal some interesting opportunities
Tracking your competitors’ important search terms
See the most important terms and compare yourself to competitors
Why colour is important in website design
Just because it looks good to you doesn't mean it looks good to everybody
HTML improvements straight from Google
You'll get a nice list of ways in which you can improve your on-page SEO
Leapfrogging to postion 0 on Google
Featured Snippets are one of the biggest things in SEO right now.
It’s about customer interaction, not the brand
Customers know they'll be working with you as individuals
Explaining AdWords Quality Score – an update
When all's said and done, Google is interested in maximising the amount of revenue it makes
AdWords budget changes: make sure you’re not caught out
You're now going to need to revise daily budgets accordingly
ICYMI – All the blog posts from October 2017
Our monthly listing of everything which has been in the blog in the last month...
Recording the real actions on your website
Google Tag Manager can convert most actions into Google Analytics 'events'
Should I write articles for my site or for others?
My cop-out answer is that everything should be written for both.
The best headline for case studies
Many of the proven formats do have a place in serious professional writing.
Keywords Everywhere – a very useful free tool
This neat browser extension will instantly show you the search volume and AdWords cost for a particular search
Wording things better
It's unlikely that many companies will find themselves 'penalised' by duplicate content
How to ask Google to index a new page
There is a way to speed up the process, and it's done through Google Search Console
What are ‘canonical’ tags and should I have them?
Many website content management systems will do this for you
Google supports ‘preload’ list of HTTPS sites
This might end up as a quality signal for Google - who knows?
It’s all about writing content aimed at getting links
That's something which you or a switched-on PR company should be able to handle.
Why Vivaldi is a web browser worth trying out
Vivaldi is able to take advantage of all the extensions developed for the market leader
How you can make your marketing emails work harder
The best way to create a good subject line is to use one of the tried and tested formulas
A quick font change for an easy site upgrade
Using the original 'web-safe' fonts now makes your site look like it was designed in 2002
Refresh your website with a more logical header panel
It is possible to split links and menus into separate rows, and this is something you might want to try
More on contact forms versus email addresses
You can - in a way - measure how many people email you from a clickable email address on a website
Tidying up https and Google Analytics and Search Console
You can also now group the different search console sites into a 'set'
Keep the customer satisfied
Surely easing the procedure for customers to do business with us is the primary function of our website?
Don’t use video as a gimmick
Website visitors are impatient enough anyway without having to wait for video to load
ICYMI – All the blog posts from September 2017
Our monthly listing of everything which has been in the blog in the last month...
More quick link building wins
These are easy links which will get you traffic and better Google rankings
On the future of advertising
Online advertising, although already massively disruptive, has held itself back through publishers' greed
A button means ‘do something’
Many business-to-business websites seem to think that somehow buttons aren't appropriate
Make online image adverts prove their worth
Even for advertisers just using pay-per-click advertising to generate site traffic, this is essential
A page can’t rank if it doesn’t exist
If we want to rank highly for specific terms, we need a good page about that term
Making your video a star of the Google results
Keep an eye on what the competition has done, and make sure you do it better
How to make promotional video interviews easily
All that's needed is for someone to come in with a camera and lapel microphone, sit down and do it!
Title tags for better clickthrough rates
In the end, SEO is about traffic generation, not search engine ranking
Nearly every website visitor comes from the same place
I don't meet many people who fully understand the implications here
Making working from home work
What tips can I give you, as someone who's worked from home for 25 years?
Oh no, here comes another ‘microsite’
There are very few situations where I'd recommend having a microsite on a new domain.
What terms need to be in your AdWords campaigns?
Filter out any terms where you averaged being in the first few positions
We can all learn from testing in search advertising
We might be able to use the results in all sorts of other marketing collateral
What’s on your company’s Facebook page?
It makes no sense not to spend some time creating and maintaining a Facebook presence
Ironing out the wrinkles in changing to HTTPS
If they suggest that it's not a 10-minute job, they're right
Forget the rules of writing and be flexible
Consider your medium when writing your articles or correspondence
ICYMI: All the blog posts from August 2017
Our monthly listing of everything which has been in the blog in the last month...
You too can be a magazine publisher
Commissioning a tame journalist to produce an article every week shouldn't be difficult
Keeping better control of when your search ads appear
Your ads can end up showing in undreamed-of places if you're not careful
You only need to outrun your competitors
The marketing teams at the Yellow Widget Company aren't any cleverer than you
PDF documents: did you consider mobile users?
Can PDF documents be designed for viewing on a small screen?
Easy backlinks, very little persuasion required
Have a think about what products and services your company uses
Putting sales emails to the ultimate test
The real problem however wasn't those current business clichés.
Why you need Google Tag Manager and how to get it
With Google Tag Manager you can easily set up things like measuring views of PDF documents, or video plays
Changes in GMail advertising
We doubt whether ads for industrial products appearing in personal, non-work email streams is a wise move
What searches are sending people to my home page?
You need to ensure there's an immediately obvious link to the product on the home page
When the wrong page shows up in Google
Does it matter? Yes, but primarily from a user experience viewpoint
My brain hurts, and it’s your fault
"Don't Make Me Think" is something that should be uppermost in all our minds at every stage of website design.
Warning: Information Overload
As advertisers, we have to get to grips with what our customers are doing
SEO boosts you may not have considered (3)
Here's a final set of ideas on small things you could do to improve SEO
SEO boosts you may not have considered (2)
Again, don't expect miracles, but any of these could make a difference
SEO boosts you may not have considered (1)
Don't expect instant page 1 positions, but they may all add up
ICYMI: All the blog posts from July 2017
Our monthly listing of everything which has been in the blog in the last month...
Keep your logos and banners professional
Nowadays, images get resized at the user end in ways you can't imagine
Smart, informative email signoffs
I'm noticing more emails which really look messy, with just too much information
Google and their ‘snippets’
They're the "call to action" which actually gets people clicking on the result
Three ways to get more responses. Probably.
Perhaps you'd like to see this article with the addition of a cat?
People will not type complicated URLs into their computers
A really simple tip, and one which I could have written 20 years ago
Just say no to churned-out ‘articles’
In moderation, when the sites which publish them are good ones, that's great
Internal linking: you need to be clever with it
And it's easy to add to your site in the odd spare moment
How much should search advertising management cost?
Your budget is an important factor if the charges are on a percentage basis.
Focus on customer needs, not their classification
If they want blue widgets, they search for 'blue widgets'. That's where you need to be.
Simply the Best
People are trying to find out whether one thing is better than another, or even what the best thing is
Not just for books
Using Amazon and even eBay as outlets to move quite technical products? It might be worth a thought
ICYMI: All the blog posts from June 2017
Our monthly listing of everything which has been in the blog in the last month...
Time to get your .uk even if you don’t need it
You're really not saving yourself much by putting off the purchase
Who owns your website domain registrations?
It's amazing how many companies do have their incredibly valuable domain names registered in the name of a third party
If the user likes the page, Google probably will too
Google's aim is to rank pages in order of usefulness
How to make an attractive YouTube thumbnail image
The impact on what can be relatively dull technical business videos cannot be overstated
What is Native Advertising?
Advertisers have always wanted to get into the main content of the media where they advertise
Browser size is not screen resolution
It's not about the screen size which people are using, it's the window size which matters
Online considerations for sales event organising
Rule one is to clearly state the date, time and venue on every piece of communication, right at the top
Why titles should be more than just a label
So how do we write title tags which people want to click on?
Ignoring website traffic from your own offices
It's not too difficult, but it does involve setting up a 'filter' in Google Analytics
The home page is no place for a slideshow
Too often, it's just slapped in by lazy designers and indecisive website management.
It’s not the same old searches which should concern us
Every sixth or seventh query doesn't have any direct historical precedent
We need to get cleverer with Google
Clickthrough rate on a "number one position" in Google is down massively
Start – and finish – with the reader
If all the reader sees at first is your apologetic introduction, they'll assume the rest of the email is also about you
Here’s a new idea: press coverage!
It's funny to see a new generation discovering something as if it's new.
Retrofitting a smarter hierarchy
New category listing pages might be of interest to customers as well as helpful in the search engines
ICYMI: All the blog posts from May 2017
Our monthly listing of everything which has been in the blog this month...
Turning your ‘page not found’ page into an asset
Links to your most attractive or newest content should be just the start
Spot the difference
Here's a really good tool to use if you ever need to check a website for changes
Attracting Google’s attention
Do consider this nothing more than a polite request for an expedited visit
Designing your emails for mobile: a critical task
Even more than websites, therefore, our emails need to look good and read clearly on mobile screens
‘Carousel results’ in Google creep into technical products
We need to know how to get in these carousels, right?
How website structure should reflect customer thinking
All Google and its keywords are telling you is how your customers are thinking
Designing in SEO – your job, not a designer’s
Those of you who do have a new website on the horizon have a great opportunity
Time to consider an online store?
People who want to buy by more traditional methods still like browsing online stores
We’re the marketing assistant sitting quietly in your office
We're always there, just beavering away on your behalf
Interruptions only get in the way if you let them
Why do we prioritise other people's problems before our own?
You could be fined for even asking about email marketing
For a few companies, I suspect this might eliminate their entire email marketing database
Learn from the best
In search marketing, that means identifying who's doing better than you, and analysing what they're doing.
Monitoring what really matters
Our client pointed out that it had fallen off the first page of Google results
ICYMI: All the blog posts from April 2017
Our monthly listing of everything which has been in the blog this month...
Bring out your dead
There's no doubt that pages can improve their ranking in the search results over time
What is RSS and how do I use it?
Every day, people discover RSS and wonder how they coped without it
Why you need to associate your company name with product terms
If your brand is not relevant to the product in the customer’s eyes then it isn’t in Google’s
Are you shooting yourself in the foot with your footer?
Ask yourself if it's a genuine benefit, or just distracting
Some rules for a landing page …or any page, really
You just want to tell readers what you've got, and make them do something.
Changes on YouTube as annotations phased out
YouTube has now decided that cards and end screens are the way ahead
Using your advertising to test out website design ideas
You'll almost certainly find a clear winner after a while
They can easily get a coffee somewhere else
It's not worth risking actual sales just to keep a marketing machine fed
The real impact of useful website content
Why vanilla 'website visitors' is a terrible metric by which to assess the success of online marketing
ICYMI: The Best of the Blog in March 2017
Missed any of this month's articles? Here's your chance to catch up...
What counts as a high-quality page?
If your page meets these requirements, expect to be ranked very favourably
It’s what you say, not where you say it
Imagine your search advertising campaign is a poster campaign around the town
Don’t shoot the messenger
The idea that Google is responsible for everything on the internet is ludicrous
The danger of not thinking about what bounce rate means
Why might three out of four visitors leave as quickly as they came?
The logo tagline: an unmissable opportunity
It's a huge free opportunity to get a message over to your visitors.
Online display advertising: target with care
Advertisers only have themselves (or their advertising agencies) to blame
The best way to get people to watch your videos
My favourite option is a third way, and the least glamorous
Google Analytics for Beginners – the online course
Worth doing for anyone who also has their CV in mind
Are you driven by guesswork?
It's easier than ever to survey your own customers. Find out what media they prefer.
Checking for duplicate content on your website
You might think you have no duplicate pages, but you'd be surprised
If only Google was allowed to see that content
We can't expect Google to promote our sites for free if we make it hard to see the information
Microsites: we have quite enough domains already, thanks
There might be reasons for doing this, but you're making an awful lot of extra work for yourself
Start answering your public better
This is a lovely tool for anyone looking for article titles or even doing keyword research for SEO
Google wants answers. You should give them.
With voice search liable to take off over the next few years, questions and answers will become even more important.
Getting creative to get round unwanted Google results
It may take a bit of creativity to remove Google results which aren't helping your business
ICYMI: The Best of the Blog in February 2017
Here's the latest "in-case-you-missed-it" roundup from the February blog...
Unwanted emails do not come without cost
Emails need to be sent at the right time, for the right reason.
The fascination of the “In-Page Analytics” report
Instantly analyse what thousands of viewers of the page did next
Speed equals time to destination
Too many business websites are designed to reflect the structure of the company, rather than the needs of the user.
Google Suggest autocompletion: a friend for keyword research
ne of the simplest tools in 'keyword research' is starting to type the term into Google
How to compile a list of terms to target for SEO
Inevitably - and rather sadly - many marketing managers start off in the wrong direction.
It’s time to bring case studies into the 21st century
Accept that your own website and email newsletters are their main - or only - target
How to create an ‘online cuttings book’
I can see this service being of use to larger in-house marketing teams too.
Google Alerts: your trusty link-building tool
Make sure you set up alerts for your company name, your brands, and your people.
What’s been eating up more of your time recently?
The marketing communications role is getting more pressurised
Being able to close a sale does not make a great salesperson
Why great sales and marketing organisations are as good at 'opening' as they are at 'closing'.
At last: poor-value online advertising starts to decline
Online advertising spending (except Facebook and Google) has already peaked and is now falling!
Pop-ups are annoying, right?
If you have an offer that you'd like to make to your website visitors, might this be a good way of doing it?
ICYMI: The Best of the Blog in January 2017
Here's the latest "in-case-you-missed-it" roundup from the January blog - Google and the https protocol, 404 pages, how hard your website works for you, and consider adding video to your 2017 plans.
“How To Choose” is an answer, not a question
Think more carefully about what people are likely to be typing into Google before writing the article
Something you can do right now to get some links
A few extra links can be worth hundreds of pounds in additional visits
How to link your YouTube channel to your website
Here are Google's instructions for associating your YouTube channel with your company website.
You need a good, up-to-date LinkedIn profile
If you're updating your profile make it a priority to have a current, presentable photo.
You’re in the Google results. But with what pages?
If the wrong page is showing in the results, it'll presumably get a low click-through rate
Focusing on traffic can be an expensive mistake
Make sure you really understand how traffic is behaving on your website before you throw good money after bad
Why you should bother to write to your best customers
A good technical newsletter with three or four items is surprisingly easy to compile
What are Ad Rank and Quality Score?
Quality Score is not used at auction time to determine Ad Rank, but get a good Quality Score and you can assume your Ad Rank is decent too.
Who’s been looking deep into your website?
The start of a new year is always a good time to take stock of where we are
No comments
A couple of websites I regularly visit have scrapped their reader comments section in the past year
How much are you paying your website?
I'd argue that you should be treating the website with the investment associated with a person
Making this the year when PPC advertising really works
Resolve to go through all the latest possibilities and determine whether they're worthwhile
Make 2017 the year of more video
Resolve to produce at least one or two videos every month this year
Investing in website speed: something we can all do
Best of all, there's an achievable objective: getting your site to that magic 85% mark
Happy New Year
Just best wishes for a very happy new year from Jackie, Laura, Paul and me at Business Marketing Online.
Best of the Blog in December 2016
This month's "in-case-you-missed-any" roundup of articles comes to you a bit earlier than usual
Why Slack is my business application of 2016
What Slack has done is to resurrect instant messaging from the technology grave
Business is about people, and so is advertising
It makes us feel good to see our own company advertised all over the place
Refocusing your efforts where they really count
The definition of insanity is doing something over and over again and expecting a different result
Reaching those hard-to-reach verticals
You can't use search advertising to target one sector and not the other.
How will pay-per-click advertising change next year?
Most innovations tend to enter the advertising ecosystem over a long period and can be seen well in advance
All about SEO and advertising on the DuckDuckGo search engine
Is DuckDuckGo about to become a key part of your online marketing considerations?
Putting some numbers on your website’s SEO
Wondering why a competitor is doing so well in the Google results and you're not?
Should we chip in for Wikipedia?
It's easy to criticise how Wikipedia's costs have grown, but I'm happy to push £10 their way through a couple of Paypal clicks once a year
AdWords ‘Responsive Ads’: we like them
This is a great opportunity to get image ads shown widely and affordably.
Just keep plugging away
Capitalising on opportunities when they arise separates hard-working websites from the rest
Video as content: don’t limit yourself to the written word
There are reports that more videos are appearing in Google results. So do keep making videos.
Avoiding an unpleasant situation
How would taking that approach affect your marketing? It's worth thinking about.
Best of the Blog in November 2016
Ensure you ask 'Are you sure this has been done?', and you should get a yes to all 10 points...
Setting a KPI for every advert
It's all data which will take us one step further than 'intuition' in the future
Are hamburgers the best thing on the menu?
A structure designed for small screens inevitably focuses on simplicity
Is your site search losing you business?
You're better off without one at all than you are with a bad one.
Decluttering your website without replacing it
Needy-looking icons begging people to post a link on Facebook? Seriously?
Invest in the IT guys for some real returns
Allocating a few hundred pounds a year on improving your performance should be a no-brainer
What browsers and operating systems are your website visitors using?
It's quite surprising to see the inertia of old versions of Windows
Button up for better response
Buttons give the user a clear indication that there's something they can do here
10 things to check before launching a new website
I can't tell you how many times designers miss this off
Are you just seeing part of the big picture?
Looking at the big picture will pay off in the medium to long term
Is your offer as compelling as this one?
I'm not suggesting that we can all instantly offer our prospects something so appealing
What searches is my website appearing for in Google?
It's a 30-second job which your website manager can do for you
Introducing the audio-centric web
Was this quicker than finding the company's website and the 'contact us' page? You bet it was.
