Web marketing in Rochdale? ... a lot of hot air designed to keep computer geeks employed...right?

Well, not quite. But that's what often happens if customers don't think carefully about who they employ to create, and to manage, their online presence. Whilst some are reputable, there are plenty of 'Search Engine Optimisation' or 'SEO' companies out there who will try to separate you from your money for doing precious little.

But that's not how we work at Dalemedia. We are so confident of our processes that we guarantee our results. Put simply; if we don't achieve what we say will achieve, we give you your money back. Period.

Of course your website has to look good. Of course it must be easy to use. And of course it must provide timely, accurate information to your customers. But it also needs to generate leads. It needs to convince people to buy your products and services.

Otherwise, really, what's the point?

There are, of course, many definitions of a great website, but whatever you are selling, discussing or presenting, the content must be attractive, useful, informative and compelling - from your customer's point of view. No-one else's opinion matters more.

This point is so important that it's worth saying it again; if we may paraphrase a well known maxim, "CONTENT, CONTENT, CONTENT". It is useful CONTENT that will ultimately lead you to online success. Nothing is more important..

In addition, the site should be well-laid out, simple to navigate and include features that encourage users to come back again and again - often referred to as 'stickyness'.

Above all, your site should be so impressive that the end user, without even realising it. becomes part of the marketing process. After all, if what you offer is attractive and informative your customers will tell their friends and colleagues about it - driving more traffic to your site. Some of them may even want to link to it from their websites - which will help with search-engine rankings, as we shall see.

So, how do we do it?

Well, let's first consider first the site's visual appeal. As you can see from our portfolio Dalemedia have created many visually-appealing websites. A good many include punchy Flash-animated branding, intricate 3D animations and high-definition online video. They are all easy to use with an attractive interface.

But looks aren't everything are they? So let's assume we've built a great looking site with lots of compelling features. What happens next?

Perhaps the most important consideration in any web strategy are the steps you need to take to get good search-engine results.

As you probably already know, if you're beyond page 3 in any set of results, you might as well be on page 103. No matter how glorious your website is, if no-one knows it's there it may as well be a hundred miles out to sea.

So now we need to consider how your site 'looks' to a search engine. Whilst it's possible to 'trick' search engines into giving your site a reasonable ranking with a variety of methods - some ethical and some less so - for it to get to the top, and stay at the top, it must have long-term appeal to the customer. And, luckily, that's a reasonably democratic process.

To explain, a site that offers something unique and useful to customers, on a regular basis over time, will get more and more people wanting to link to it. Google, and other engines, assume that if lots of websites link to a given website then they are effectively 'voting' for it. And if a site that links to your is, itself, a popular website, then the 'vote' is worth even more. (OK, perhaps that's not quite 'one-site-one-vote' and arguably less democratic, but you can see the point).

Making your website appeal visually is one issue; making it appeal to search engines is another. This approach is called 'search engine optimization' or 'SEO'.

The first step to understanding the search process is to understand keywords. If, for example, you sold Moroccan furniture in Anytown you would want a pretty high-ranking result if someone typed "Moroccan Furniture Anytown" into their favourite search engine. In this context, these three words are referred to as 'keywords'.

Whatever the agreed keywords finally are for your business, our aim will be to ensure your website appears as high up in the 'organic' searches as possible when someone uses them in a search engine.

(Note, organic searches are the results that generally appear in the centre of search engine pages, not the paid-for advertisements or 'sponsored links' which usually sit on the right or the very top of a results page. We will discuss these paid-for ads more in a moment).

To generate these organic results, the search engines use what are known as 'spiders' to examine the content of millions of webpages - including yours. Dalemedia's job is to help those search engines find your content easily. In short, we try to make your site as 'search-engine friendly' as possible.

The development of the source computer code on each web page is a significant part of this process. These snippets of code are called META tags; a bit like signposts which the spiders can follow when they search the Web for information. Whatever else you may have heard, the idea is not to trick the search engines, but to leave them abundant clues as to what your webpage is all about. That way, the search engines deliver results to the users that are relevant.

So, with our Moroccan furniture business we have already seen an example of 'keywords'. The keywords needed for your business will be quite different of course but the principle is the same.

There are three sets of source code tags that we need to think about; the TITLE, the DESCRIPTION and the KEYWORD tags.

Initially, we wil devise a TITLE tag for each web page.

This tag gives search engines their first clue about the likely content of the page - and to some degree the visitor too as it appears at the top left of their browser window. In other words, the title for each page should be rich in the keywords that you want people to find you with...perhaps between five to eight words.

The words people are most likely to search on should appear first in the title. This title is effectively your 'identity' on the search engines. The more people see what interests them in the blue hyperlinked words on the search engine result they get, the more likely they are to click on the link.

That's why, when we prepare a webpage, we write the article first, then develop a keyword-rich title. For example:

"Moroccan, Importers, Furniture, Chairs, Arab Chests"

In this imaginary search result, the two descriptive keywords the visitor typed are highlighted blue in the results.

Next we need to write a 'description' META Tag. This will not only help the end user understand what might be shown on your web page - because it's written in plain English - it also helps with the optimisation process.

Some of the search engines will include your description below the hyperlinked title we mentioned earlier. The description will be a sentence or two describing the content of the webpage, using the main keywords and keyphrases visible on the page itself. For example:

"Anytown Importers bring you the finest Moroccan furniture at the best prices ..."

The maximum number of characters should be no more than 255; only the first 60 or so are visible on Google, though more may be indexed.

Now we need to consider the KEYWORDS tag. So from the DESCRIPTION tag we strip out the common words, like 'a' and 'the', leaving just the main keywords and phrases. We insert those into the keywords tag. (to be honest, this particular tag is no longer used much for ranking, but we leave it in anyway).

So now, every webpage in your site will have a distinct TITLE, a distinct DESCRIPTION and distinct KEYWORDS tags. Now the search engines have something to go on when they try to index you.

Importantly, we won't include keywords that don't appear on the webpage itself. There would be no point. Search engine algorithms match the text they 'see' in the META tags with the text in the main body of the visible content.

There is an excellent 'Super Tool' created by the Web Marketing Group that can help you identify some of the basic keyword, description and title errors you might be making with your current site. Well worth a look.

Now we make sure your chosen keywords also appear in the main body of page text in what are called 'header tags' - H1, H2, H3...H6.

Each is considered by the search engines as a clue from you that some important point is being made on your web page; H1 being the most vital, H6 the least. Search engines consider keywords that appear in the page's headline, and these header and sub-headers to be important to the page, so we make sure your desired keywords and phrases appear in at least one or two header tags.

We then must position your keywords in the first paragraph of the body text. Search engines expect that the first paragraph will contain the important keywords for the document.

Now we include descriptive keywords in what's known as the 'ALT' attribute of image tags.

This helps your site be more accessible to site-impaired visitors and gives additional clues to the search engines. The ALT attributes do help get your images ranked higher for image search so it's well worth doing.

If you hold your mouse over the images below, you should see the ALT tag information. If the end user has chosen to switch images off on their browser, they will still be able to see some of what the designer intended to achieve.

For example:

This is an image	This is an image with a link
Image only with images OFF	An image link with images OFF

Search engines are also looking for clues as to the focus of your webpage.

So when they see words hyperlinked in your body text, they consider these potentially important, so we hyperlink your important keywords and keyphrases internally within the site. For example:

"This link on page 1 will take to to a very important article on page 2"

Most importantly, all our designs make the navigation around your site easy. We want search engine robots to find all the pages in your site.

Experience tells us that it is worth developing several webpages on your website, each of which is focused on a target keyword or keyphrase for which you would like a high ranking.

Now we create a site map. A site map page with links to all your pages helps search engines (and visitors for that matter) find all your pages, particularly if you have a larger site.

In addition, we generate what's known as an XML sitemap. These are also used by the major search engines to index your webpages accurately. So we create one and then submit it for you.

As we have already discussed, search engines like to see that other sites link to yours. In other words, 'external' links.

The quantity matters to some degree, but more importantly, it's the quality of incoming links that are most important.

Links from trusted, popular sites help your site rank higher than links from lower traffic sites. So it makes sense to develop reciprocal links with other businesses in your industry. You will benefit from the the link from them to you, and they will benefit from the link from you to them. The really great thing with reciprocal links is; no money changes hands. It's a genuine win-win situation for everyone.

However, the art and science of building 'backlinks' is considerably more detailed than can be covered here. Suffice it to say, you need a professional team working on your behalf on at that issue alone.

Given that many people search for local businesses on the Internet, we always include your business' street address, postcode, telephone number plus several town names that your business serves. We include these place names in the title tag too.

So if someone is looking for Moroccan furniture in Anytown, they are quite likely to type the following into a search engine:

"Morrocan Furniture Anytown"

And the result, ideally, will be somewhere on the first page of search results. For example:

"Moroccan, Importers, Furniture, Chairs, Arab Chests Anytown

Anytown Importers bring you the finest Moroccan furniture at the best prices ..."

Next, where relevant, we promote any video, images and audio content within your site.

Google's displays not only webpage content, but also displays relevant listings for images, videos, local businesses and audio clips near the top of the page.

Therefore, at our initial meetings with you, we will help you consider creating such content appropriate to your business and then optimizing it so it can be ranked high enough to help you. For example, if you commissioned us to create a web video for you, we could include it as a traffic generating tool. And if you were to get a top-ranking video on YouTube that mentions your website, it could drive a lot of traffic to your way.

Now we will create a free listing for your local business on Google Maps, Local Business Centre and Yahoo Local. That way your business will show up on a map when people do a local search.

'Social Networking' and 'Viral Marketing' are real buzz phrases these days.

Social networking sites often include online communities for business; good examples being Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. Search engine spiders check through these sites looking for links to something new and relevant.

But what relevance do they have to marketing your site? Well, for a start, Dalemedia can create a profile on these sites for you, then place a link from those profiles to your website. But, truthfully, the biggest gain comes when other people on such sites:

• Mention you - helping generate traffic to your site
• Link to you - which arguably increases your ranking and helps to bring traffic
• Bookmark you - which arguably increases your ranking and brings traffic

If you create something that a significant number of social networking site users like, their enthusiasm can snowball into lots of their friends visiting your site. When this happens, you are effectively the beneficiary of viral marketing...

It's worth considering writing articles for others to use in websites and newsletters. These are known as 'blogs' - a contraction of 'Web Logs'.

If you write articles in your area of expertise, and distribute them to editors as free content for their e-mail newsletters or their websites, then you might dramatically increase your site's visibility. Just make sure to ask for a link to your website and a one-line description of what you offer be included with the article. This is an effective 'viral' approach that can produce hundreds of links to your site over time.

Next we'll consider issuing online news releases.

Depending on the marketing package you have chosen with Dalemedia. we can help find newsworthy events, and help to send news releases to print and web periodicals in your industry. The links to your site in those online news databases may remain for several months, even years, and can improve traffic to your site and increase link popularity.

Placing your website address - known as your Unique Resource Locator or 'URL' - in online copies of your press release can increase link popularity.

It's worth considering the development of 'free' services to your online customers. They may well be enticed if they see special offers for web transactions. And while it requires a commitment of time creating a monthly e-mail publication it is one of the most important promotion techniques.

It could be a newsletter, a list of tips, industry updates or new product information -- whatever you believe your customers will appreciate. This is a great way to keep in touch with your prospects, generate trust, develop brand awareness and build future business.

It also helps you collect e-mail addresses from those who visit your site but aren't yet ready to make a purchase. An e-mail newsletter appears in your readers' inbox is just asking to be read.

Try to personalise the email wherever possible. If you know the recipient's name, use it. The best way to get people's email addresses is to create special offers for them. If they sign up, you can reward them with discounts.

Be creative. If you keep careful records, you can send e-mails to customers on their birthday to remind them to return to your site. Subscription confirmation e-mails can also mention several popular products.

You might remind customers that it has been three months since their last order and ask if it's time for a refill. 'Thank you for your purchase' e-mails can offer a coupon to bring your customer back for a future sale. Use your imagination, but don't pester your customers. You're there to serve them, not the other way around.

Send special offers, coupon specials, product updates, etc. They often initiate another visit to your site. If you have a regular newsletter, you can include many of these in your regular e-mailing.

Announce a contest. People like getting something free. If you publicize a contest or drawing available on your site, you'll generate more traffic than normal. Make sure your sweepstakes rules are legal in all states and countries you are targeting. Prizes should be designed to attract individuals who fit a demographic profile describing your best customers.

Don't neglect e-mail as an important way to bring people to your website. Every single email you send out should have, at the very least, a hyperlink back to your website.

Your monthly newsletter can be emailed as an HTML web page. We can advise you on how to set this up if you don't already know.

Now let's consider traditional marketing strategies.

A web marketing campaign is only part of the story. Just because traditional strategies aren't on the Internet doesn't mean they aren't effective. A mixed media approach can be very effective.

So include your URL on stationery, cards and literature. Make sure that all business cards, stationery, brochures, and literature contain your company's URL.

Promote using traditional media. Don't discontinue print advertising that you've found effective. But be sure to include your URL in any display or classified ads you purchase in trade journals, newspapers, and Yellow Pages. View your website as an information adjunct to the ad.

Use a two-step approach: capture readers' attention with the ad, then refer them to a URL where they can obtain more information and perhaps place an order.

Look carefully at small display or classified ads in the back of narrowly-targeted magazines or trade periodicals. Sometimes these ads are more targeted, more effective, and less expensive than online advertising.

Consider other traditional media to drive people to your site, such as direct mail, classifieds and post cards. TV can be used to promote websites, especially in a local market.

Now we'll look at submitting your site to key search directories. They are often 'manned' facilities as opposed to their electronic equivalents like Google.

A link from a directory will help your ranking and get you traffic. A directory is not a search engine. Rather, it is a hierarchical listing of sites sorted according to category and subcategory. a great example is the free Open Directory Project. Yahoo Directory is another important facility, as are About Us.com and Business.com.

Where relevant, we submit your site to trade organisation sites and specialised directories. Some directories are focused on particular industries, such as education or finance. You may belong to various trade associations that feature member directories. Where that's the case, ask for a link. We'll create a reciprocal one from your website to theirs, if they ask for it.

Although we charge for our time developing the strategies mentioned above, they don't cost anything in and of themselves. But if you want to grow your business more rapidly, there may come a point when you want to pay for increased traffic.

Online advertising is sold in one of three ways:

1. Traditional CPM (cost per thousand views)


2. Pay per click (PPC)


3. Pay per action (PPA) or cost per action (CPA) approaches

Examples of the latter are affiliate program and lead generation programs. Banner ads get such a low click-through rate (0.2%) that we don't recommend paying much for them. Do some small tests first to determine response. Then calculate your return on investment (ROI) before spending large amounts.

If you wish to do so, we can arrange Pay Per Click (PPC) ads with Google Adwords for you. This strategy is way down the list, but it could end up being important, especially for events you want to highlight at short notice. The organic results are often quite slow to respond so it may be that an Adwords campaign with Google is the answer in such cases.

These PPC ads appear on the search engine results page, typically both above and to the right of the organic search-engine results. Since they are keyword-driven, they can be quite relevant to what a searcher is trying to find. Your ranking in this list of paid text ads is determined by:

1. How much you have bid for a particular search word compared to other businesses


2. The click-through rate on your advertisement


3. Your 'Quality Score', which reflects the relevancy and quality of your ad and the landing page it points to

PPC ads can be a cost-effective way to get targeted traffic, since you only pay when someone actually clicks on the link.

Phew...well, that's was a lot to take in!

But a combination of some or all of the above techniques is essential if you want your new website to get noticed. And with a Dalemedia Marketing Package most of the processes above would be undertaken by us.

So if the idea of having a web marketing strategy appeals to you, why not get in touch using our Contact Form, or by using the Express Quotation Form at the top of this page.

Or, better still, call us on 0844 809 9576 now. We're delighted to help get your business where it deserves to be!