Tag Archives: SEO Sheffield

The Importance of Ongoing Organic Content Creation for SEO Campaigns

Driving high-quality traffic to your site is the primary goal of any SEO campaign. Through the combination of organic, high-quality content – and white-hat link building techniques – you can give yourself the best chance of doing this on an ongoing basis.

To help you achieve your ranking goals, it pays to have an experienced company doing the work that you require. With that in mind, Seven Creative are perfectly placed to help; and continue to offer Sheffield SEO services to businesses on both a monthly and one off basis.

Focussing on the production of shareable, engaging website copy; they have a proven track record when it comes to successfully ranking sites across a wide spectrum of trades. With that in mind, this company have put together a guide to help explain why organic content should continue to form the cornerstone of your SEO campaign.

Getting Site Visitors to Engage for Longer

Focussing on the production of content that offers genuine value to your target website users can benefit you in a number ways. Primarily, it will ensure that you’re providing your potential customers with useful information; that will ultimately persuade them to choose your services. As a result of this, it’s likely that those users will engage with your site for a longer spell of time.

Google will look fondly upon this; as the longer a visitor spends on your site, the more the search engines will flag it as a valuable source of information. Finally, if the traffic you receive likes the content, they’re more likely to delve into the deeper structure of your site. This means a reduced bounce rate and more subsequent points scored with the search engines.

The Benefits of External Linking

If and when other web users start to link to your site, the subsequent SEO benefits can see you rise further up the ranking positions. If people see value in your business blog copy, they may feel compelled to share it across social media and other bookmarking sites; which can only have a positive effect.

Not only will the links built back to your site by this activity act as golden flags to the search engine algorithms, they will also raise exposure of the shared content you’ve written and get in front of more potentially high-value website visitors.

Meta Data, Image Optimisation and More

A steady stream of site pages – that you can carefully optimise for SEO purposes – will come as a result of continued organic content production. Each new page presents a chance to for you to integrate search terms that you wish to be found for; whilst the accompanying meta data you can fill in is another factor the search engines will be weighing up when debating the value of your site.

Every page of copy that you produce can also be optimised with relevant images, which when added correctly can also give your site a boost. As long as you consistently stick to good practices, you’re sure to see an improvement for your website in the search engine ranking positions.

Contact These SEO Experts in Sheffield for Assistance

When implemented well, SEO can become a profitable long-term investment for your business. To speak to one of the SEO experts in Sheffield at Seven Creative about tailoring a campaign to suit your needs, give one of their team a call today on 0114 383 0711.

Improve Your Website SEO with These 5 Helpful Tips

Adapting to SEO trends remains a constant challenge. Yet it needn’t be something that causes frustration. By sticking to clear, concise strategy you can look forward to improved web rankings – and ultimately more genuine traffic to your site.

You can minimise the impact of algorithm changes by taking care to publish optimised, organic, useful content on your site. Not only will this always be well-received by Google; it will also retain customers visiting your site for longer (also great for SEO).

Whether you’re looking for one-off SEO site work, or ongoing content production, you need to make sure that you pick the right company to carry out the work for you. As Sheffield SEO experts, Seven Creative are well-placed to help:

Have a Clear Idea of Your Goals

For your SEO campaign, make sure that you have a clear idea of what you want to achieve before you start. If you work within a competitive trade, for example, you’ll be more likely to see page 1 results by targeting one of your niche services. Similarly, adding a geographical focus to your activity can also help you maximise the benefits of SEO.

You Must See SEO as a Long-Term Marketing Strategy

It’s essential that you remain patient with this digital marketing strategy. For monthly campaigns in particular, it needs to be something that you invest in for the long term. A re-work of your website can improve your positions fairly quickly depending on how competitive your keywords are, but if you then don’t continue to add regular, organic content -whilst your competitors do – you’ll soon find yourself sliding back down the SERP’s.

Detailed Monthly Reports Are a Must

SEO needn’t be all smoke and mirrors. If you’ve had a bad experience with paid services previously, that will only be heightened. A company that provides you with detailed, transparent, monthly reports can be worth their weight in gold; and you’d be wise to choose such a firm to carry out any SEO work that you need.

Regular Blogging is Vital

Don’t underestimate the importance of business blogging, which can be great for your brand image. When optimised correctly, this content is perhaps the most important factor with relation to how the Google Algorithm deciphers your website.

Engaging news articles, case studies and blog articles are the best way to show the search engines that you have something of value to offer on your site, so this really is an opportunity not to be missed.

Make Sure New Content is Optimised

Whenever it comes to adding new content to your site, make sure that it’s optimised for the search engines. If you’ve hired an SEO company for one-off site work but now want to try it yourself, it’s essential to maintain good practices such as adding descriptions and alternative title text to any new images you add to your site.

SEO Experts in Sheffield

Maintaining practices such as the ones mentioned here will stand you in good stead for your SEO campaign. To implement the strategy, it’s well worth hiring professionals Seven Creative, who are here to help.

Their SEO experts in Sheffield can provide you with engaging web copy; that will stand the test of Google updates to fire you up the rankings – and then keep you there. You can get in touch with them today on 0114 383 0711 to find out more.

Ever wondered if SEO will work for your business?

Sheffield SEO

Sheffield SEO

One of our fastest expanding services we provide at Seven Creative, here in Sheffield, is SEO, and there is one thing that nearly all our new SEO enquiries have in common – they’re nervous about the idea of embarking on an SEO campaign!

So, why is this? Firstly, not many people truly understand what SEO actually is. To me, it’s simply about making sure a site is of high quality meaning that it can effectively communicate with Google about its subject and purpose (which is a win-win for everyone). It’s certainly not about creating a million inbound links from poor quality sites to manipulate the search results! Secondly, the results seem to intangible. This was something we noticed early on so we made sure that an activity report was available to everyone – regardless of their budget – on a monthly basis. Thirdly, many people have been ripped off in the past. Even now, knowing what we know about how Google evaluates websites, poor quality companies with unethical sales people are still conning trusting people out of their cash by providing poor quality SEO that somewhere between little and no effect to how a site indexes – in fact, poor quality SEO will often have a negative effect on rankings; so don’t underestimate Google’s increasing ability to spot a cheap link!

It’s perfectly understandable why Google doesn’t like the current SEO industry – Google wants to be the one evaluating websites; historically, SEO has been about manipulating results to make a site appear more relevant and important that it would normally appear – so everything the search giant is doing in terms of regularly updating its algorithm is pushing site owners towards best practice and high quality content; and away from link building.

So, to refer back to the initial question, it depends. Of course I would say you should call us but if you don’t here are my top tips to make sure you pick a good company:

  • Avoid companies that outsource – it’s probably a sign that it’s going to be poor quality SEO
  • Ask to see examples of reports – this won’t give you an idea of the results you’re likely to achieve but you’ll be able to see the way those results are presented.
  • Speak to their current customers – happy customers are happy to recommend.
  • Avoid pay-on-results agreements – this incentives the SEO company to provide poor quality SEO for an immediate boost that wears of very quickly when you stop paying.
  • Go local – we all know how nice knowing that the person you’re relying on is available when you need them!

For more information about Sheffield SEO services, call Seven Creative on 0114 383 0711 or click here for more contact options

Google Doodle Celebrates Thomas Chippendale’s 295th Birthday

Here at Seven Creative web agency and Sheffield SEO company, we’re big fans of the Google doodles. You’ll often hear a little yelp and the words ‘Google doodle!’ from behind a computer whenever we come across one.

google-doodle-chippendale-furnitureToday, we are treated to a Google doodle commemorating Thomas Chippendale, the English 18th Century cabinet maker and furniture designer.

He would have celebrated his 295th birthday today and holds the record for the most expensive piece of furniture ever sold – The Harrington Commode, a chest of drawers that sold at auction for £3.8 million.

 

It’s a very elegant doodle too, with the Google letters delicately surrounding 2 chairs, a dressing table and an ornate mirror. The ‘G’ sits on one of the chairs, and appears to be applying make up in the mirror!

5 things you must do to have a successful website!

As a Sheffield based marketing agency, we are aware that there are lots of small to medium sized businesses out there that don’t have much of a web presence. We’ve put together 5 simple but very important things you need to do to have a successful website.

Make your website mobile-compatible

Sadly, lots of small to medium sized businesses websites are not compatible with mobile devices. People are moving away from their desktops at a rapid pace, preferring to browse the internet on the go on tablets and smart phones. If your website isn’t suitable for these devices, for example, not optimised for smaller screens, you and your business are missing out on a huge audience.

Social-media-management-sheffield

Be active on social media

As we know, social media marketing is powerful tool to market your business. By not embracing social media, you are not only falling behind your competitors, but also missing out on a huge captive audience. Your social media accounts also need to be connected to your website!

Have an email link and contact number on your homepage

It is absolutely necessary to have an email link on the home page of your website for consumers to contact your business. Email is a really convenient way of getting in touch, and without a visible email address, you may be missing out on inquiries,  questions from potential customers and even sales.

It is also incredibly important to have a phone number listed on your homepage. Some questions are better answered by phone, and some people prefer to speak to an actual person as opposed to emailing.

Generating phone calls via your homepage makes customers feel comfortable, while not listing a phone number may make people question your legitimacy.

Have an inquiry form built into your website

A form-fill option on your website is a great way to allow consumers to request information. Information inquiry forms should be built into your site, connected to a CRM, an email system, and an ecommerce system. That way, the lead is not just being collected, it’s also being prepared for the business owner to communicate with and generate business via that lead.

Make sure your website is search engine optimised

What’s the point of having a website if no one can actually find it? When people visit a website, a lot of them will have found it through search engines (hopefully!) Key words are essential for being discovered on search engines. This includes keyword research and creation, on-site search engine optimisation and off-site link building. These are all important elements for driving traffic to your website; they will make your site search engine friendly, improve your website’s rankings and allow your business to gain exposure.

As a web marketing agency based in Sheffield, we know how important it is to have these points in place. If you are worried that your website isn’t working for you as well as it could do, or you are missing any of the above, don’t panic – we can help.

Contact us by telephone on 0114 383 0711, email chris@sevencreative.co.uk, or click here to fill out the contact form on our website.

Social media successes and failures

Social media marketing can be a fantastic tool for promoting your business online and marketing your brand. Done properly, social media can generate a buzz that has the power to be seen by thousands if not millions of people. On the other hand, a post that goes bottoms up has the potential to be seen globally.

Here at Seven Creative, we’ve put together a few of our favourite social media successes and fails for you amusement. Enjoy!

Social media successes

Honda’s upside down approach to social media paid off in a big way when they offered $500 to the most active Pinners on the social scrapbooking site Pinterest to take a 24 hour break from the site to promote the new CRV. Ingeniously, they called the break a ‘Pintermission’ and then asked the winners to create a board about all the activities they enjoyed on their day off. Honda reached more than 5.5 million followers of the chosen Pinterest users  with this campaign.

We love the chocolate Facebook thumbs up created by Cadbury too. And no, not just because it looks delicious! Constructed as a Thank you to their fans, a real time video feed of the construction process drove massive fan engagement and resulted in a huge quarter of a million people actively involved in the campaign. They also gained an extra 40,000 fans! I wonder how many more they would have gained if they’d promoted a competition to win the giant choccy hand??!

Cadbury-Facebook-Thumbs-Up

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Social media mega-fails

McDonalds dropped a real clanger with their social media activity which resulted in their campaign being terminated within just two hours. Using the hashtag #McDStories, Twitter users were ‘supposed’ to share heart warming anecdotes about their McDonalds experience. Instead,  tweets about food poisoning, fingernails found in burgers and chicken nugget horror stories went viral. Well, we could have predicted that!

American Apparel’s Hurricane Sandy promotion backfired spectacularly after it offered customers 20% in an email stating “In case you’re bored during the storm, 20% off everything for the next 36 hours.” In reality, those 36 hours turned out to be devastating, with more than 130 deaths, 4 million with no power and billions in damage. American Apparrel apologised saying the campaign came from a good place. Too late, damage done!

Australia’s SellItOnline.com said that it would donate money to Tasmania’s bush fire crisis, but only if people liked its Facebook page. Understandably, an angry fan responded, “Don’t take advantage of this situation. If you’re for real, donate through the right sources. Don’t manipulate social media for your own benefit.” Another wrote, “F*** off with your opportunist marketing trying to take advantage of other people’s tradegy. If you were a decent company you’d just be putting a message up saying you were donating x amount and earning some kudos.” Mmm you’ve got to see their point……

If you’re struggling with social media, and would like some advice on setting up and or managing your businesses social media accounts, Seven Creative can help. We offer a social media set up service, social media management packages, and even regular social media workshops in Sheffield. Contact us on 0114 383 0711, email chris@sevencreative.co.uk or contact us through our website.

Fantastic testimonials from our social media and SEO workshops

social media management  in sheffieldSince holding our very first search engine optimisation and social media workshops last week, we’ve been thrilled to receive some fantastic testimonials from those who attended.

“Thanks very much for the information I gathered at the social media review last week, I must say I came along with the usual reservations that you have about whether the whole thing might be very ‘techy and geekified’ and not relevant to our market, but it was brilliant.

Excellent practical advice that was superbly delivered and will be a benefit to me in my day to day work. I really got a great amount out of the day. The training was excellent; I would highly recommend Seven Creative to others.

The SEO and social media review was informative and most importantly relevant, with plenty of information given. Any business that did not take you up on this fantastic social media review is really missing a trick, now all I have to do is get off my backside and put your wonderful advice into action!”

Brain Drury, Blue Funk Hypnosis

“Thankyou for inviting me along to one your internet marketing seminars, it was very enjoyable and informative, and done in  such an informal way that I’m sure put everyone who attended at ease, whether computer literate or not.

After listening to your team it soon became apparent, not only how much opportunity social media can offer companies in gaining new business, but also how well Seven Creative understands these markets and how to use them to your clients’ advantage.

I would recommend anyone to take advantage of your future workshops, as it won’t cost them anything to do so and will surely help them understand where social media fits into business and how it can help them drive more traffic towards their business.”

Simon Platt, Utility Warehouse Authorised Distributer

Don’t forget, we’ll keep you posted on future social media and search engine optimisation workshops in Sheffield – watch this space! If you would like to find out more about our social media management packages or our SEO packages, please call the Seven Creative team in the office on 0114 383 0711 or contact us via our website.

SEO and Social Media workshop success for Seven Creative!

Thursday 7th February marked an important date in the Seven Creative calendar. We held our very first search engine optimisation and social media workshops at The Workstation in Sheffield!

SEO workshop at the showroom sheffieldIt was a pleasure to help lots of new people and some familiar faces get to grips with Search Engine Optimisation and Social Media. With a full day of 30 minute slots, we certainly had our work cut out for us!

The staff at Seven Creative spent the day helping local business people learn more about using the internet to boost their businesses. We are proud to say that the event was a huge success and we’ve received some very positive feedback.

Simon Platt, a utility broker from Sheffield, said “It’s not often you get any kind of advise nowadays without having to delve deep! I really liked their approach.”

Karen Bird of Kurly Bird Event Management attended the workshop with her sister Sarah Green from Fable, the Sheffield based Epilepsy charity. Karen said, “Both Sarah and I came away with lots of ideas and found the time really productive.”

Among the many visitors that dropped in throughout the day was Daryl Williams, founder of GlassBox Photography.  Daryl said, “It was a really helpful session. I’ve come away with plenty to think about and the skills to be able to make changes to my website to win the war against Google!”

We were really kept on our toes as a wide variety of different businesses came through the door. Joy Harrison of Murphy’s, a company specialising in natural products made from essential oils and herbs for horses and riders, filled our last slot of the day. Joy said “It was so nice to be pointed in the right direction. I love working on my website and teaching myself marketing, but it sometimes feel like it’s an awful lot to do. I really appreciate Seven Creative’s help!”

We will be holding regular workshops throughout the year on a variety of topics including search engine optimisation, social media and blogging, and will keep you posted regarding dates and times here on the blog, our Facebook page and via our email newsletters. We also offer social media management packages and SEO packages, which are perfect for those who don’t have the time to do it themselves.

For more information, contact Chris at the Seven Creative office on 0114 383 0711 or contact us via our website.

Icon Business Solutions discuss the role of management in business

Here is the latest article from Tano Rebora, our guest business writer from Icon Business Solutions.

Tano Rebora Icon Business SolutionsManagement in all business and organisational activities is defined in dictionaries as the act of getting people together to accomplish desired goals and objectives using available resources efficiently and effectively. Management comprises planning, organising, staffing, leading or directing, and controlling an organisation (a group of one or more people or entities) or effort for the purpose of accomplishing a goal.

So there it is – people; goals and objectives; using available resources effectively, efficiently. Note that it does not say where (other than organisation or effort) so by implication, anywhere and at any level of human activity.

All ‘professional’ people immediately stand to attention and see the implications applied to business whilst rejecting that such notions exist in any other field.

Dictionary definitions continue by stating that the word derives from the latin ‘manu agere’ to ‘lead by the hand’ and this is at the base of management skills; it is about giving direction that is stronger than just a passing suggestion yet not an order and also implies that the person doing the leading knows where he is going and is going first, willingly, to where the follower is being lead. The leader is not asking the follower to do something he is not willing to do himself.

But let us move sideways for a second and leave fuzzy people ‘things’ to one side and let us consider the much harder, more concrete ‘business management’ first.

What do we mean by ‘business management’?

Well, if an enterprise is to be managed effectively and efficiently then at least the Board must know what the correct corporate vision and mission is, mustn’t it? Otherwise, if there is no understanding of what the business is to have achieved in a specific time period the chances of success are hugely diminished.

It is much easier when both are present because this can lead to planning achievable objectives in realistic times. It’s the point at which the ‘Executive’ strategic level manages the tactical to achieve long term aims.

Business Management – Goals and objectives

It stands to reason that, if there are reasonable vision and mission statements then good management dictates that appropriate, preferably numeric, objectives can be derived from them for the Managing Director/C.E.O./Owner to ‘own’ and be responsible for delivery in measurable timescales. This can then be cascaded down the organisation, irrespective of the depth and complexity of that organisation.

At a simple level there are three basic levels of hierarchy in any business – the operational, the ‘Management’ (tactical) and the Executive (strategic). For the ‘one man band’ – all three need to be considered and applied. Therein lies the basis of many company failures – but that’s for another time.

All three levels need to be accountable and all the objectives must funnel upwards and downwards to fulfil the success criteria for the business.

Setting the goals/objectives and measuring people on their achievement against them is at the heart of ‘business management’.

All different functions must be managed on this basis, as example:

Sales:

  • Director: KPIs based on company revenue, company profit ; departmental profit; territory cover; Wins vs Losses; client satisfaction; team performance. All, as appropriate dependent on market, sector, high value vs low value, timescales and other factors.
  • Manager: KPIs on team sales target; profit target (as above); client acquisition; territory coverage; client satisfaction. The above constraints apply.
  • Salesperson: revenue, profit (if applicable), number of new Accounts

Marketing:

  • Company/departmental/sector revenues; number of suspects and prospects created totally attributable; competitive positioning (wins/losses)
  • Sub divisions of these depending on structure and responsibilities.

Operations/Production

  • Company revenues and profit margins
  • Number of units produced
  • Efficiency of equipment and employee levels
  • Health and Safety
  • ‘Returns’

Other functions such as Financial/Legal and Human Resource should be similarly treated as should any sub-functions for example; Product Development, Product Marketing.

The above list is not complete and it is not intended to be. It is just an example of the sort of tangible, concrete objectives that can be measured.

There are tomes written on how to set these and Peter Mayer (Attitude is Everything) describes good objectives as being SMARTERS (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, Ethical, Rewarded and Satisfying Strategic goals.). There are other words used for the acronym but I choose to finish on the last one for good reason – Satisfying Strategic goals.

Everything that everyone in any company does is focused on getting the business forward today (operational level), tomorrow (Management tactical) and in the future (Management Executive).

So, all employees now know what tune they are marching to at every level but how does anyone know how different people are performing, individually, departmentally and at company level to ensure company success?

People Management – Not so ‘fuzzy’ stuff, then ‘fuzzy’ stuff
Well, the answer to the above is – no-one does, unless there are proper Human Resource processes in support.

How many companies, again, at any level, have these? In my experience – very few.
Rarer indeed the ones that have the end to end processes that guarantee performance such as:

  • Hatch: Recruitment -attracting the right people at the right time and the capacity to tell the difference in measurable ways (there you go- there’s a good SMARTERS objective for HR people already!).
  • Batch: Appraisal – setting the correct objectives and regular meeting to match objectives achieved with those set out. In the process also identifying ‘high flyers’, succession planning (both measurable) as well as non-performers and documenting all for action etc.
  • Dispatch: No easy way to put this one – but the actions taken must be, again, set against proper well documented situations, ethical and with respect for all individuals.

Well, that was non-fuzzy but what about fuzzy stuff?
Have you noticed that some people just manage to get more out of other people than others might do?

What do we call that? Leadership? Charisma? The innate or developed (there’s a question!) capacity to ‘lead by the hand’ (please re-read previous introduction).
People/Managers can spend a lifetime blithely managing by objectives and not totally understand how to get the best out of their people, always managing to make their own objectives without understanding how they can do more through their ‘fuzzy’ people management skills.

No matter how well the company may be doing and may be business managed these are the ones that, typically, make the best sales to the most loyal client base; may need less human resource in production to achieve best output; may hire or help hire the best people in the marketplace….the list is endless.

Oh and who measures them? They may well be managed by people who, let’s repeat here, people who ‘always manage to make their own objectives without understanding how they can do more’. Perhaps understanding this and hiring for ‘fuzzy’ traits is what makes good companies great.

From Maslow through Herzberg to Goleman and beyond there has been tremendous work done on people motivation through the years precisely focused on this.
Companies are made from the top down but without the right business and people management skills with the right processes they will never be successful.
So if any of the above resonates – act on it, for that is the role of management in business!

This article was written by Tano Rebora and was originally published on the Business Matters blog.

Tano offers free, no commitment Business Health Checks, which will guarantee companies with business building strategies upon request. To find out more about Icon, visit the website at https://www.iconbusinesssolutions.com or email Tano Rebora at tanorebora@iconbusinesssolutions.com

Free SEO & Social Media surgery – The Workstation, 7th February 2013

Seven Creative digital marketing SheffieldSeven Creative Social Media and Search Engine Optimisation surgeries

Seven Creative are running a free 1-to-1 Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) surgery and 1-to-1 Blogging & Social Media Optimisation surgery at the Workstation in Sheffield on 7th February 2013.

Search Engine Optimisation surgery

The Search Engine Optimisationsurgery is suitable for businesses who have a website but are not sure how well it is optimised or would like advice on how to further optimise it. This 1-to-1 SEO surgery will help evaluate how well your site is optimised for search engine indexing in terms of both on-page and off-page optimisation.

During this free and confidential session we’ll look at the major search engines and evaluate your competition. We’ll then focus on the steps that can be taken to increase the search engine visibility of your site.

Social Media and Blogging surgery

The Seven Creative Social Media and Blogging surgery is suitable for anyone wishing to either begin using social media & blogging to promote their business, or those who wish to optimise their current social media activity to increase the online visibility of their business.

This 1-to-1 Social Media Optimisation surgery will help evaluate how well your current social media activity is working to raise the profile of the business and whether this activity can be further optimised.

During this free and confidential session, we’ll look at the appropriate social channels based on your customer profiles. We’ll also help with the steps that can be taken to further optimise this activity, increase the business’ online visibility and further engage with your online audience.

Booking

Slots are available with advance booking and are up-to 30 minutes in length. To book, email Seven Creative at booking@sevencreative.co.uk or call 0114 383 0711 for more information.