Coaching For Success
Business Coaching
About The Internet Business Coaching
Monitoring Customer Reviews Is Critical To Your Business’s Success
Apr 5th
Do you know how your internet business‘s web site ranks in the search engines? Marchex, which supplies marketing products to small businesses, did an analysis of results of searches for small businesses internally and found that 80% of the results didn’t point to the web sites of those businesses; rather, they pointed to social networking sites and user reviews.
Be Aware Of Your Search Engine Rankings
The businesses involved in Marchex’s analysis were mainly consumer-facing, such as plumbing, restaurants, travel, etc., businesses all likely to be reviewed by consumers. Therefore, it behooves companies like these to monitor where they rank in search results with similar web sites, as opposed to compared with review and social media sites.
It’s now getting to the point where practically every business is being reviewed, so you’d be well advised to keep an eye on what people are saying about you (whether it be true or not) and to be in a position to respond to negative criticism before it becomes a fully fledged viral hate campaign. Of course, the best way to avoid this type of situation is to make sure you provide each customer with the best service possible.
Possible Places To Find Reviews Of Your Business
The first places to look for reviews of your business would be social media sites like Twitter and Facebook. After that, here’s a list of some of the top review sites to check:
1. AngiesList.com
A trusted site providing paid reviews of local businesses that has a membership of over 1 million.
2. BBB.org
While a relative newcomer to the consumer review scene, the Better Business Bureau site should be bookmarked by every business owner.
3. Epinions.com
Solicits and publishes reviews on practically anything available for purchase online, from pet supplies to luxury autos.
4. SiteJabber.com
Provides reviews of web sites as a whole, so it’s very important to make sure good things are being written about your business.
5. Buzzillions.com
Emphasises product reviews, including electronics, housewarea, sports clothing and equipment, etc. If your business is involved in supplying products of any kind online, you should check this site for reviews of your product offerings.
Customer Reviews Can Make A Big Difference
Amazon.com was one of the first sites to allow customers to post reviews of various products, and since then the number and variety of sites offering reviews has grown substantially, so much so that many consumers make their final purchase decision based on reviews they read online.
If you’re not doing so already, you should encourage your internet business‘s visitors and customers to leave reviews, while staying on top of what people are saying about your business around the web.
A UK internet marketing consultant can work with you to formulate a strategy for advocating your business online and monitoring what others are saying about it.
Use Heat Maps To Find Out What Works And What Doesn’t
Apr 1st
The use, analysis and understanding of heat maps on your internet business‘s web site can provide many benefits, not least of which are the ability to see where visitors are and aren’t clicking, predicting the optimum placement of ads, aiding with future design and re-design, etc. Heat maps can pretty much provide any and all information on metrics concerning your web site, so it’s mainly a matter of knowing what to look for and then making plans accordingly.
Heat Maps Alone Don’t Tell The Whole Story
Heat maps are great for showing how users interact with the various elements on a web site such as links – the more intense the colour the greater the amount of interaction. You can see which parts of a site users are most interested in and which they aren’t, allowing you to make adjustments to your site accordingly.
Heat Maps + Analytics = Bingo!
But, heat maps don’t tell the whole story as far as optimisation is concerned. Using analytics in addition helps track other, non-clickable elements, thereby covering practically all aspects of a web site for optimisation purposes.
This way you can get an understanding of not only user interaction with links but also how users interact with other elements on your page and site that aren’t clickable, i.e. how they interact with a page as a whole. For instance, armed with heat maps and analytics, you’d be able to see which links users hover over and for how long, giving you some idea as to the effectiveness of anchor text.
Also, knowing how much time elapses between a page loading and a user clicking a link gives an indication as to whether an element has been placed in the right area for maximum conversion.
Heat map analytics can also be very helpful when it comes to seemingly unrelated data, such as referrer information. You can find the pages with the highest entry points and then, using heat maps, find the relationship between the highest ranked referrer and the number of clicks or lack thereof. You can then test landing pages using multiple variables and approaches based on the traffic source.
Points To Bear In Mind During Analysis
Analysing data from heat maps can be time-consuming and labour-intensive, so here are a couple of points to bear in mind that may help bring focus to the analysis:
- Consider removing any areas that receive few or no clicks, and replace them with something else to see if that generates any more interest.
- While it’s great to know how much user activity there is on a given page, what may prove even more useful is checking the activity on a page the user clicks to. If nothing happens on a particular page, it may be that the user has hit a cyber dead end, so fixing that possible roadblock should be a priority, giving the user either product recommendations or fresh content.
A web site is a tricky balancing act between functionality and aesthetics, and your site should guide the user to the desired outcome. Providing too many options and you could leave users confused; providing too few could end up misleading users.
Using heat maps along with analytics can provide excellent insights as to what is and isn’t working on your internet business‘s web site, but making changes based on those insights doesn’t guarantee success. Your mantra should be “Test, test and re-test” and then “Monitor, monitor and monitor”.
A UK internet marketing service can give you guidance and advice on the best use of heat maps and analytics to optimise your web site.
Google’s New Check-Ins Add To LBS Mix
Mar 30th
You may already be promoting your internet business on such location-based services (LBS) as Foursquare, Yelp or Facebook Places, and are well aware of the benefit to your business of this type of service.
Now Google has announced that it’s adding check-in capability to Latitude, which is the social feature of Places, Google’s location-based service. This should alter the LBS horizon significantly, especially when you consider that, according to a study sponsored by Microsoft, Google Places was already the most widely used LBS, beating out Facebook Places. Google Check-In also has some additional features that are very popular with users: location check-out and ability to set notifications.
There Are Apps For That
In addition to its massive user base and global search dominance, Google also has the increasingly popular Android operating system as its mobile platform, through which it offers Google Places apps for both Android powered devices and the iPhone. These apps integrate Google’s other location-based services, including Google Navigation and Maps.
Combine all this with Google’s global expansion of its review and ratings service, HotPot, and Google now offers users the ability to share locations and review and rate local businesses on their mobile platform.
Let’s Make A Deal
Google obviously sees offering deals as a major new opportunity – recall the $6 billion offer to buy deals leader, Groupon – and is rumoured to be seriously looking into launching its own deal service, provisionally named Google Offers.
In the meantime, Offer Ads allows businesses to send coupons via SMS and e-mail to users to drive foot traffic to their physical locations.
A Winning Combination
With all these various services combined into a neat, tidy package, Google is positioning itself to be the business owner’s one-stop shop when it comes to mobile services.
Business owners already using Google Places to promote awareness of their products and services may well see this convergence of all these service offerings as an advertising perfect storm of social, mobile and local marketing.
Now that Google’s home page offers internet business owners check-ins, ratings and reviews and coupons, there’s no need for businesses to go scouring the internet to find the best option for one or other of these services when the world’s leading search engine offers them all under one roof, so to speak.
Using Google Places and related services can boost your business’s exposure both on- and off-line, so contact a UK internet business coach today for increased exposure tomorrow.
Set Your Web Site Up To Succeed Internationally
Mar 28th
Regardless of where your internet business is located, being found by searchers on search engines anywhere in the world is important when it comes to expanding the reach of your business and possibly improving your financial situation.
Make It Easy For Searchers To Find You Globally
One thing that most people crave is information, so it’s not surprising that search engines attract so much traffic. Regardless of what type of business you run (informational, blog, e-commerce), it’s important to appeal to searchers across as many search engines as possible by researching trends and the keywords used in searches.
But, since the internet has no boundaries, it’s equally important to understand that there’s tremendous global potential for your business. So, instead of just targeting the audience and topics associated with your particular geographic location, you should also look at international news and trends and the kinds of information people are searching for, and research keywords relevant to those topics. In this way, you can get your brand exposed to potential customers worldwide.
Sources Of Global Information
To find what’s causing a buzz on the worldwide (literally) web, here are some sites that will provide you with sources of information on various global topics, including entertainment, politics, news, social trends, sport, etc., giving you ideas for creating content and describing your products to expand your reach to an international audience.
These sites can provide valuable data and insights into keywords and phrases being searched for throughout the world, enabling you to craft your web site’s content to transcend global boundaries and cultures. So, let’s take a look at these resources and how they can benefit you and your business.
1. BBC.co.uk
The BBC is a fantastic source of global news and entertainment information, and, while the majority of the traffic comes from the UK, it also has a massive worldwide following.
2. Reuters.com
Another great news source that you can access by browsing the tabs and using a translation option to find out what the hottest trends are.
3. Twitter.com
One of the world’s most popular web sites, this is a great source for news and to find out what the latest hot topics are. To find out what’s happening elsewhere, use the “Trends” option sorted by region and country.
4. Blogger.com and Tumblr.com
While tricky to navigate and find what you want, both these sites are well respected and highly trafficked by the international community. Setting up a blog is easy on these sites and will get your content in front of a sizable international audience.
5. Reddit.com
This site is a bit offbeat and humorous but again has a good-sized international audience and provides sortable categories for politics, news, etc., making it useful for identifying trends.
6. CNN.com
Another great news source, popular mainly in North America, but CNN International is useful to check international trends and CNN’s Facebook page can give you a good idea of what’s important to your network.
Using these resources can help you extend the reach of your internet business internationally by capitalising on the trends that are popular amongst the international community.
A UK internet business coach will work with you to establish your business’s presence internationally through the use of the above resources along with many others you may not be aware of.
Analysing Key Performance Indicators Is Essential To Web Site Health
Mar 25th
As an internet business owner, it’s important you know whether or not the effort you’re putting into your search engine optimisation (SEO) strategies is paying off.
In order to do that, you need to look at certain key performance indicators (KPI), but the question then is, “Which ones do you look at?”. Good question – here are some of the more important KPIs you should monitor.
What’s The Goal When Looking At KPIs?
It’s important to recognise that the main goal when looking at KPIs is to find out what’s working on your site and in which areas there is room for improvement. Through analysing KPIs, you’ll discover useful data as your site improves and moves closer to the desired finished product. This data should then be shared throughout your organisation to help improve communication and decision-making at all levels.
The good news is you don’t need to be an expert in analytics to be able to understand and take full advantage of these KPIs. Even though it would be helpful to understand analytics, reports are generally available that will provide most, if not all, of the information needed.
A Look At Essential KPIs
The analytics used may vary by organisation, so it’s possible different KPIs will be used to measure how well different web sites are performing and all the following may not be applicable, so that should be borne in mind.
1. Average Number and Type of Keywords per Page
This KPI can help you discover whether or not you’re taking full advantage of “long tail” keywords. It’s also essential to explore further to find what your users’ interests are and what they are searching for, along with the conversion rates of the top-ranking keywords.
2. New Visitors / User Loyalty
You can learn about the organic traffic coming to your site and its characteristics, including the percentage or rate of new visitors, visitor type by keyword, etc.
3. Average Length Of Visit And Visit Duration
These are both excellent metrics when examining the natural/organic traffic coming to a web site. Knowing which pages of your site get the shortest length of stay will show you SEO opportunities for improvement.
4. Page And Traffic Totals
These are the simplest and most obvious indicators, as well as some of the most revealing. The health of a web site in SEO terms can be determined by the number of pages ranked by and being found in search engines, indicating the overall exposure of a web site.
5. Bounce Rate per Search Engine By Keyword
Knowing the bounce rate for the various keywords on your site can show how effective keyword analysis had been and also provide insight into the demographics of your visitors.
6. Length of Keyword Queries
If you know the number of keywords used in users’ queries, you can tailor your site to take advantage of that type of long-tail search. Also, if you see a trend towards longer keyword searches resulting in more traffic, that indicates a tendency towards more long-tail queries, so it’s safe to assume your site’s performing well for those types of queries.
7. Pages And Categories That Receive Most Traffic
This is a vital metric for SEO success, since knowing which sections of your web site receive the most traffic and which receive the least shows you what’s working and what’s not as far as SEO is concerned. If an area is receiving little or no traffic, that’s an indication that more work needs to be done to ensure users find that area; if an area is doing well as far as traffic goes, you should look at ways to expand that particular area.
These are important KPIs to analyse, but there are many others that may also be appropriate for your internet business, depending on the type of business you run.
It’s important to track how well your search engine optimisation (SEO) efforts are going, and a UK internet marketing consultant can provide you the analytical skills you need to use these metrics to maximum effect.
