Archive about April, 2010

Engineering Search Engine Results

Tuesday, April 27th, 2010

As I keep getting these spammed comments on an earlier blog that bear no relation to what was said I thought I would tell you what Google recommend as good Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) techniques to gain a good position on search engines.

They split it into three sections, Design and Content; Technical and Quality Guidelines and I think that each section deserves its own page, so I shall just sum it up for now.

The best search results are those that when you search for something you find what you are looking for. That sounds really simple but it really is that simple.

Here is an example, just say you searched for Web Design, Redruth. I would guess that would be because you want to find a Web Designer who is based in Redruth. So these are my results on 27 April 2010.

There are only 5 links to current design companies based in Cornwall. 3 links are to directories of design companies, so I suppose that is not too bad. But the one I just wander about is a company that is based in Cumbria and Dundee.

This is something that quite a few web design companies use, they basically fill up the page with the relevant town keywords, such as Redruth, to get a high position. So that is good isn’t it? Or is it? What do you think. I personally get frustrated with this kind of result, I visit the website and find it is not what I want and leave immediately.

If get a lot of people who visit your web page and then leave without looking around, this is called a high bounce rate. If you have Google Analytics on your website you can check out your Bounce Rate. You want to achieve a low bounce rate as you want people to read what you have to say and find out more, not leave straight away.

So what am I saying – sending people to your website under false presences is not good for business and will just increase your bounce rate.

How is your bounce rate?

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Posted in Search Engine Optimisation, Website Design | 4 Comments »

Spam in Blogs and SEO

Wednesday, April 21st, 2010

I was rather intrigued to get 3 posts on my Blog What shall I blog about? – all three didn’t really make much sense to me. They didn’t seem to be commenting on my Blog. Then it dawned on me -

I have been spammed!

Why spam? Well I suppose it is probably best described as bad search engine optimisation (SEO) techniques.To explain lets take the search engine Google as an example.

Google allocates each website a page rank from 0–10, this page rank indicates how important Google considers it. When you search for something in Google the results are based partly on this page rank.

Google advise that a page rank of a website can be increased by the number of high-ranking websites that link to it. So in other words, if you get a link from the BBC website, that will count more to your website than your best friends website.

So here I am sat in my office, in Pool, just outside of Redruth, in the lovely county of Cornwall and I am thinking – is my website that important? Will it increase someone else’s page rank? Obviously three people (or one person) thinks so. Or they are just picking blogs at random to add a link so they can charge their customers lots of money! Probably the latter.

Note to self – next blog obviously needs to be good techniques for SEO.

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Posted in Search Engine Optimisation | Comments Off

Promotional Leaflets

Wednesday, April 14th, 2010

Print is not dead – promotional tourist information leaflets still have importance.

On my recent visit to Madeira it suddenly struck me that print is not yet dead. What did I do whilst on holiday? Go around and collect leaflets from either displays or people. Why? Because I only had one week on this beautiful island and I wanted to make sure I saw the most important places (well for me anyway).

Now I had looked at various tourist information websites before I left UK to see where I fancied going, but in order to make sure I was getting the best deal I found the leaflets very useful. Especially when some of them included a free city map of Funchal to go with it, very helpful to pop into the pocket of your shorts.

Tourist Information leaflets I collected on Madeira

Was I influenced by the quality of the leaflet? Yes I was – not wanting to get stranded at the top of a mountain I did trust those that looked professional. I also was surprised with the information included, as I like to know exactly what I am getting for my money. Is this because I am a Graphic Designer? I don’t think so, I reckon a lot of people think like me. Do you agree?

But it makes me think, being based in Cornwall do we promote in the same way? CATA, and similar organisations, do a good job at getting leaflets out and about but I still think we can take a tip from the foreign resorts.

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Posted in Print Design | Comments Off

BBC Spotlight

Thursday, April 1st, 2010

Parson Willimott’s Cornish Sketchbook

I was delighted to see Parson Willimott’s Cornish Sketchbook featured on BBC Spotlight last night and I thought they did a really good job in featuring the book and its purpose.

If you missed it, William Willimott, when he was rector of the parish church of St Michael Caerhays in Cornwall, designed, made and installed the stained glass windows in the church. Unfortunately the windows are now in need of repair and a booklet of Parson Willimott’s sketches has been produced to help raise funds.

Parson Willimott's Cornish Sketchbook

The booklet is a collection of sketches that Parson Willimott compiled during the last two years of his life whilst living with his sister in Ipswich. Each sketch portray events that took place many years before, with a written explanation of the event. They are very amusing and he brings the events to life.

Lets hope that by it being featured on BBC Spotlight enough money will be raised to help restore the windows to their former glory.

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Posted in Print Design, Recent work | 1 Comment »