Some of you may already know by now that Design One For Me moved offices in February, relocating to Earlsdon, Coventry. We are now in a great school catchment area.

With new websites going live in January and February, some new projects on board for the Spring, it’s looking good for the rest of the year. Be sure to check out our web design portfolio for recent additions.

Improved Search Engine Rankings

Over the past few months, Design One For Me has helped bump some of our clients up the search engine rankings ladder.

Debbie at The Leather Workshop has been delighted with her improved ranking. Before taking on this project, her existing website was nowhere to be found in the search engines. Following our re-design and search engine optimisation, her website now currently ranks number 1 in the natural listings (not paid for) for her main keyphrase ‘motorbike leather repairs‘. Debbie continuously reports back positive feedback from her clients as well as increased traffic and sales.

Below is what Debbie had to say:

“I have been so impressed that Design One For Me have achieved such a significant improvement in my search engine ratings and in the short space of a few months! I have had a definite upturn in inquiries since Design One For Me have been on board, plus I now have a professional looking website that I can be proud of. How reassuring to have a friendly source of help and advice and to know that my website is being managed so efficiently.”

Sam at Phoenix Art Gallery has been impressed with his websites ranking having only gone live a month ago. Before beginning our optimisation activity the website previously ranked 100+, however, it now appears on page 2 for two keyphrases ‘sell art online‘ and ‘buy art online‘ in an extremely competitive market. Over the coming months with our continuing search engine optimisation activity we aim to get the site on page 1 before the summer.

Below is what Sam Evetts (Founder of Phoenix Art Gallery) had to say:

“We approached Design One For Me with an idea for an online art gallery, Phoenix Art Gallery. They worked closely with us throughout the entire process, right from the original brain storming meeting through to the final product, this included registering the site, stationary design and printing, website design and build and finally the gallery launch. We were so impressed by all the services we received from Design One For Me we had absolutely no hesitation asking for their search engine optimisation services. They are currently optimising two key phrases, “buy art online” and “sell art online“, of which the results speak for themselves. Our site went from page 11 in Google to page 2 in a matter of 2 weeks for these key phrases, which far exceeded any of our expectations. We highly recommend Design One For Me not only for their fantastic web designs, but also for their outstanding search engine optimisation skills.”

Debbie and Sam are just a few of our clients currently benefiting from our search engine optimisation service. If you would like more information on how we can help your website improve in the rankings, please call 02477 411 011 or use our simple contact form.

Below is a list of ways that will help you drive traffic to your website:

Write a Blog
If you’ve read our previous article, you will understand why we have included this as a way of driving traffic to your website. The art is to frequently post as many good quality articles as you can. The more you post the higher you will rank in the search engines.

Link Building
This is a quick and effective way of achieving high rankings. At Design One For Me, we can’t guarantee you a number 1 position, however we can guarantee you an improvement in your ranking. After all, we don’t control the search engines but we understand how they work. You can also improve your link building campaign by adding links to your website in your email signatures, Facebook and Twitter.

Comment Away
An effective way of driving traffic to your website is to include a link to your website in a comment on other blogs in your industry.

Directories
Submit your website to as many good quality, industry related directories as you can.

Social Media Bookmarking
Make sure that you include social media links on your website so that people can share your content quickly and easily. These come in many forms, such as a plain text links or buttons. The most common social media bookmarks include Twitter, Facebook, Digg, Delicious and StumbleUpon.

Follow the simple steps above and start driving traffic to your site today. If you require any assistance please don’t hesitate to contact us on 02477 411 011 or click here for more details.

However, the way you run a business blog differs greatly to the way you run a personal one.

Below are a few points you may wish to consider:

Don’t over-sell yourself
Think of your blog as a conversational tool. Try and get existing or new customers to interact with you. Frequently post interesting and useful content as opposed to what products or services you offer and remember to be open and professional in your manner.

“Content is King”
Writing good, quality content can be extremely beneficial to your blog and business. Search engines like fresh content too so the more frequent you post the better chance you have of moving up the rankings.

Publish Photos and Videos
Don’t be afraid to include good quality and relevant media in your blog. The more visually dynamic your posts are, the more people will return to the site.

Would you like to keep your clients informed of new products and services and share industry information and be rewarded with higher search engine rankings at the same time?

If you answered “yes”, why not add a blog to your website.

For those of you who don’t know what a blog is, let me quickly explain. The dictionary now officially defines a blog as the following:  “a Web site containing the writer’s or group of writers’ own experiences, observations, opinions, etc., and often having images and links to other Web sites.” Blogs are mostly always public. No login forms or fees or members only sections.  Most are wide open and written by either one, or a few authors giving a consistent feel throughout. Think of a blog as a method of keeping a journal, only this time it’s online and almost everyone can read what you have written.

A blog needs to be updated regularly to be successful. Blogs provide businesses with an excellent opportunity to add fresh content to their websites on a regular basis and frequent content can result in higher rankings in the search engines.

A blog can have many uses, from personal diaries to business blogs that aim to engage and interact with existing and potential clients.  You can class each blog post like a news article – it contains relevant and current information which you can add/edit and delete in your own time. You can even assign categories to each post making it easier for people to access certain topics on your site.

Blogs have have been around for almost 10 years. Maybe it’s time you added one to your website!

With prices starting from just £300, call me on 02477 411 011, email  or use this simple contact form for more information.

Why not send a card via email this Christmas. From as little as £80 you could reach all your customers and friends with a click of a button.

Once you have chosen a design, all you need to do is supply your written message and a list of client/supplier email addresses, and you are good to go. Using our sophisticated email marketing software, we can schedule your email to be sent at a date and time that suits you. A fantastic feature to mention is the ability to see who opened the email, who didn’t and also how many times they had opened it. The software also keeps track of your email subscribers and allows your recipients to unsubscribe from emails if they wish.

So, if you fancy a change this Christmas and wish to surprise your clients with an online greetings card, why not call me on 02477 411 011, email  or use this simple contact form for more information.

The Internet is all about fresh content. As the saying goes “content is king.” To get people to your website, you need something new. To bring them back, you need to keep people talking. A blog can serve both of these purposes. Even if your main site needs to stay static by necessity, your blog can always be changing, and can be a great source of link building too.

So what are the benefits of blogging?

Search engines love them
A blog needs to be updated regularly to be successful. Blogs provide businesses an excellent opportunity to add fresh content to their websites on a regular basis. Successful updating of content would bring search engine spiders to your website frequently resulting in a higher ranking within a search engine. Search engines rank websites with blogs higher than sites without a blog. Each plog post is like a news article – it contains relevant and current information. Ideally, you should be posting several times a week.

A blog can grow with your business
Because a blog is work in progress, you can change your strategy as time goes on. When your marketing plans change, your blog posts can follow suit.

Your blog can be optimised for search engines
A blog and blog post can be optimised for specific keywords / keyphrases.  When your marketing plans change, you can change your keywords to reflect the new content in your posts. These changes will eventually be reflected in the search engines and users will find your post based on what they search for.

Simple to set up and easy to maintain
Creating a blog post is easy. It’s almost as easy as writing an email. All you have to do is log in to your blog, create a new post, start typing and publish it.

You can delegate responsibility
Blogging can be a team effort. For example, if you run a marketing department, you can start the ball rolling. Once your blog has gathered momentum, you can assign responsibilities to other members and control their permissions.

To conclude, there are many advantages to a blog. It can be optimised for search engines who love them, it can grow with your business, they are simple to setup and maintain and you can delegate responsibility.

If you would like to setup a blog for your business or simply want to manage your own news articles on your website, please telephone 02477 411 011, send me an email at  or use this simple contact form.

“So why now?” I hear you ask. Well, to be honest, there’s numerous reasons which I could go into detail about but, seeing as this is our first article, I don’t want to give away too much information at this early stage, after all, one of the keys to a running a successful blog is to keep it updated. If I decided to spill beans now, this blog will only have one post.

A friend once told me that they see a blog as a ‘work in progress’. I have to agree with them. If you start as you mean to go one, there never will be a finishing line,  just posts and posts of content. One of the great things about a blog is the fact that you can add, update and delete content whenever you like. Whether it’s a video you have seen on YouTube, a song you have listened to in iTunes, or maybe something you have read in a magazine or book, a blog is an online platform which allows you to note everything down and refer back to. Who knows, in a months time when you stumble across something new that you can relate to,  you can follow on the article from where you left off.

So, without further ado, let’s get this blog on the road!