Infoserve Group

Phil and Kirsty are right; it’s all about location, location, location. If you are a small business, it is highly unlikely that you will appear in the first page of a search engine nationally, so you need to focus on your local area. For example, if you are florists in Fulham, you need to focus on the customers who are searching for florists in Fulham, rather than florists in Falkirk and the rest of the country. Local companies do not have the budgets to complete for first page results for a key phrase nationally. It’s all about the local search.

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A recent survey by American Express and SEMPO* assessed small businesses and their digital marketing strategies. The survey found that over 50% of small businesses admitted to needing help with their Internet marketing campaigns, but only 25% said that they would consider employing someone to help them. Nearly 75% of those surveyed said that they handled their online marketing themselves, despite having no experience.

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Local search can be extremely valuable to a business. If people search online for a business or product in a specific geographic location and you get your business in front of them at this point you are well placed to convert them into a customer. Read the rest of this entry »

One of the great advantages to Internet marketing, as opposed to other forms of marketing, is that it is constantly changing and improving. The Internet is developed through programs and machines, so the possibilities are endless. Search engines like Yahoo! and Google are constantly adapting their systems to suit their users. The biggest change recently has been with the search engines recognition of the importance of local search. Research from March 2010 found that 97% of consumers use the Internet to find local businesses and 90% of these consumers use search engines to find them. Read the rest of this entry »

Ok, here’s the next its-never-been-easier blog about the best ways to market your business online.

We’ve covered:

- Infoserve KeySites, which are one/two page websites specifically designed to rank highly in major search engines for chosen search terms, like “garden maintenance in Coventry” for example (see here).

- City-Visitor, which is one of the most used business directories on the Internet. You can get a listing on here to be found on the first page of major search engine results.

The next product?

- Infoserve eStart Websites

It’s all very well getting your business to the top of search engines, but what if your website is really old or you can’t manage it yourself to update the content? Or what if you don’t even have a website?

Infoserve’s eStart Website packages are simple.

Easy-to-manage, professional looking websites at affordable prices. There are a variety of designs which, using your own images and text, can be customised to your business.

They are like template websites so you don’t pay the huge costs of design and build.

Infoserve sorts the domain registration for you (yourbusinessname.co.uk), hosting (your website has to ‘sit’ somewhere to be available for Internet users to see), but then it’s down to you.

YOU get to maintain your company website and be in control; you can view reports on how many people have visited it, edit any text to include latest offers and upload any new photos.

And if one or two pages isn’t enough, try out eStart Plus product which gives you up to 10 pages on content.

So if you want to ditch your current website (Not modern enough? Not able to edit the content at all? Worried it will cost too much?) or want to start from scratch and build up a website for your business, give us a call. It really is pretty straight forward. The hardest part will be choosing your design…

Another no-nonsense guide to Infoserve’s products to try and make everything as simple as possible for businesses looking to increase their online presence.

We started with Infoserve’s KeySite product, now let’s look at City-Visitor.

In essence, this is one of the most used business finders on the Internet – or an online directory as most people like to call it.

Someone searches for Hotels in Durham, for example, and you can bet a directory will pop up, because it provides the exact information that person wants – a list of hotels.

Infoserve’s City-Visitor website is a really powerful opportunity to help your business get to the top of search engine results. It has 12 million number one positions and 22 million first page positions on major search engines like Google, Bing and Yahoo!, so if you’re listed on here with Infoserve, potential customers can easily track you down.

Infoserve offers free listings, but to get ahead of competitors there are also enhanced and priority listings so people spot your business first.

Infoserve’s City-Visitor website basically does all the hard work for you, getting you top rankings.

What are you waiting for: contact Infoserve to find out more about how we can help get your business found online.

Here at Infoserve, we speak with hundreds of companies every day and there is a huge amount of confusion about what online marketing can do for your business.

We just want to prove to you exactly what can be done through Infoserve’s portfolio of online local search marketing solutions.

So we’ve decided to write a no-nonsense guide to Infoserve’s products on this blog to really make everything as easy as possible.

Let’s start with Infoserve’s KeySite offering.

This is a really simple website that ranks highly in major search engines for chosen search terms.

The ultimate aim is to get your business on the first page of search engine results when someone is looking for your product or services in your local area.

Let’s play that one again. Would you like to be on the first page of search engine results when potential customers are looking for you?

An Infoserve KeySite can perhaps be targeted at a new product you want to push, a special service you offer, and it can either link back to your existing website or be a stand-alone website promoting your business.

And it can be written, built and be ranking in the search engines within a few weeks.

Just give Infoserve a call to discuss what search terms you want to rank highly for.

Or take a look at some examples we’ve already done for customers wanting to rank highly for garden maintenance in Coventry (click here to see KeySite), or car servicing in Dunstable (which you can find here).

It’s no surprise to hear that we are spending more and more time online, but a survey by The UK Online Measurement Company (UKOM) estimated that the average person in the UK is spending 22 hours and 15 minutes surfing the Internet every month, which equates to almost one full day per month!

This is great news for businesses with a strong online presence, good SEO and relevant content on websites, hoping to capitalise from their efforts – and a wake-up call to those who don’t…

It’s amazing just how quickly things are evolving and the huge difference in the way we use the Internet compared to a couple of years ago. If you don’t have an effective online presence, you really will be missing out given so many people now turn to the Internet to find what they are looking for.

The full stats can be found in an article published by the BBC, showing a full breakdown.

You may have noticed a change in the way Google has been searching for your results. In the past month Google Instant has been predicting your search as you go, ‘faster than the speed of type.’ Researchers found that people type slowly but read quickly and this new innovation modifies the displayed results as you type, saving you time every time you search.

The creators claim that Google Instant could save you between two to five seconds whenever you search, and they even say that if everyone used Google Instant around the world, it would save 3.5 billion seconds a day, which could mean that 11 hours could be saved every second. That’s a lot of time saved for both businesses and their customers.

Now you might be wondering what this means for Search Engine Optimisation, and why Google Instant is important for your company. The changes to Google have meant that webpage optimisation is vital; if the key terms that a customer is searching for are being predicted by Google, it is essential that a company’s webpage has as many of those key predicted terms as possible. In the UK where 90% of searches happen on Google, tailored, effective SEO is a must.

Customers will view their Google results as more accurate due to Google Instant’s predictions, so a listing on the second page just won’t cut it, and accurate, professional search optimisation is essential. Our City-Visitor product has 12 million number one positions and 22 million first pages on major search engines, including Google, Yahoo! and Bing. Infoserve’s SEO service offers your company results that are tailor made for your business and your requirements, and our goal is to help your customers find you as quickly and easily as possible.

Our products include a Keyword Management Report: the equivalent of an SEO health check for your website.

If you want to see your website ranking higher in the search engines and want to make the most of innovations like Google Instant contact Infoserve.

Much of the commentary on search marketing these days gets lost in technical jargon. As terms become more familiar, you’ll find “PPC” and “SEO” has just slipped in to everyday language and it’s easy to get confused.

There are many SMEs out there that are feeling reluctant to join the ‘online marketing world’ because they already feel left behind, or they don’t quite understand the significance of why they need to get involved.

So when you come across some really simple research which explains the importance of building an online presence, it’s worth pointing out.

The new ‘state of the nation’ survey from the IAB (International Advertising Bureau) is one of those examples. Really clearly laid out and to the point, it sums up how businesses are beginning to prioritise search marketing as part of their wider marketing mix.

Interestingly, 78% of respondents believed that search can build a brand. How do you think your business is reflected online?

As Infoserve also keeps pushing, websites are so important for creating an online presence and the IAB found that only 37% of websites are ‘good’ at achieving their objectives which leaves “much room for improvement once consumers reach their destination.”

It would be remiss not to point out our own survey findings too about the importance of good websites, which we hope are as clear… You can find them here . Get in touch if you want any help or guidance with kick starting your mini online revolution for your business.