Glooo.co.uk

Yes you've got a great website, some nice images, great videos, interesting content, some good news features and you have the obligatory links to Facebook, Linkedin, Twitter and your getting some traffic! ' Yes tick ' I hear you cry.

But how can you improve on this?

When was the last time:

• You updated your links?
• You updated or changed your directory listings to target a new audience?
• Changed the images on the site?
• Changed the layout of the website?

I don't want go down the whole SEO road but a few key changes, at little or no cost can have dramatic effects to attracting more traffic to your website.

Take a look at your website today

• Is it clear what you do from the first paragraph?
• Does it talk to your clients or your potential clients or both ?
• Are you using the most strategic partner links to your site to drive business ?
• Have you got the most up to date photos of work you've done on your website?
• Are the quality of images good?
• Are your Facebook and Linked businesses pages up to date?
• Do your tweets deliver thought leadership?
• Do you know all the places where your business is listed on the interent, and are these listings still relevant to your business?

Small changes have a big impact love your website and it will love you.

So if you want to:

- review and validate your online marketing activities
- measure the performance of your website
- understand which Corporate clients are visiting and showing interest in your business

email This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it to arrange an initail meet up over a coffee.

Talking to Search Engine Optimisation teams, Web developers, Social media training companies, and PR companies with regard to content for websites they all talk about " who the audience is ? " and " if you know your audience then you can broadcast the right messages "



But when I talk generally to businesses about website monitoring and their audiences the response is usually
" anyone who wants to buy my products or services! "

Now I agree with this statement to a certain extent, and if your Company takes a scatter gun approach to marketing then you will hit some targets, but ultimately better results come from targeting an audience which fits not only with your service offerings but also your company ethos and structure.


OK so how do you identify this audience?

A few months back I spoke to a new client who wanted to bring in more customerss.  Within our initial meetings it was clear that the company wanted to try every form of advertising possible, to use an aggressive ad word campaign, and to cover the majority of the UK in attracting customers.

Now from a monitoring perspective this was great as all of the criteria he wanted could be covered by metrics within Google Analytics. So on the face of things we were ready to start working.

However after a quick calculation of what they were going to spend on traditional adverts, their Pay-Per-Click, and the time they were going to have to invest in delivering the activities, against the volume of sales it was blatantly apparent that the cost of sale far outweighed the return on engagement.

We therefore stepped back and re analysed what would be their ' perfect client '  in terms of initial engagement, buying process and cycle, ongoing engagement, and location. And with the results we revamped his strategy to target a specific type of business in a specific area.

This process also allowed the content writer for the business to focus more and deliver more targeted content. With the ultimate result being that client is now wining more business with a lesser cost of sale.

From Glooo's perspective commercially we worse off as we were delivering less monitoring metrics, but with a happy client understanding his audience and getting better results we keep the client for longer!

So it is a good idea to invest some time into knowing your audience.

Question:

Who's the best client in your business not only for sales but for integrating into your business. Now Imagine if you could target, replicate and win that customer 10, 20 30 times, what impact that would have on your business?

When the Director said to me " come on Chris imagine the world will explode if you don't do the next take! " I suddenly realised that the money I pay to watch a film at the cinema is worth every penny!

This is my brief story on making what will be our 1 minute Corporate video for Glooo.


' Videos are all the rage ' , ' a picture paints a thousand words ', ' You tube is the 2nd largest search engine on the planet ', the quotes kept coming so I decided it was time to delve into the world of the corporate video for Glooo.
But where do you start?

Picking the right production team, agreeing budgets, deciding on a style of video, deciding on the length of the video, writing the script. deciding who's going to be in the video..... the questions were endless.
But after some initial planning it seemed we were ready, and when the email reminder for the ' video shoot ' popped up in my inbox, reality struck.

Two weeks prior in a blind panic I hadn't even written script notes for what I was going to say so the first drama in this process was phoning the guys at Studio 8 to ask if could we delay the shoot by one week to give us more time to plan. They fully understood and accommodated me without a fuss....a trait which would last throughout the process.

So a week later and having script in hand I skipped along to the studio for my first ' Mr De Milne ' moment.

I was met at the studio by a hive of activity from both Clarke (the Director) and Barbora (the video photographer ) who were setting up cameras, lighting rigs, seats, computers etc, but as calm as anything they asked if I wanted a drink......(Gin and Tonic wasn't an option)... , sat me down, finished their preparation, and so the process began.



In the weeks prior Clarke had sent thru' some video ideas and asked me to put some basic words round our service offering based on the videos sent.

So Barbora now asked if I was ready with what I was going to say, nervously I said " yes ".


My misconception in the video production was that I would have to learn my lines verbatim and recite them line for line in one massive take. How wrong could I be!

Clarke talked to me about the style of the video again, the components involved, the fact that we could take as long as required, and 'the takes' could be done in small bite size chunks. Exhale.....Brilliant !

So here we were ready for the first take, lights, camera, sound, action. I nailed it ' introduction shot done and in the can' and on to the next ....this was easy..... Sir John Gielgud eat your heart out.

By the 3rd segment, and several takes later I realised why actors got paid so much,...... " take 6 Chris ", .......
" take 7 Chris "....For Clarke and Barbora this was normal, but with great patience they waited for me to finally deliver my lines.

Finally came the computer still shots, for ' the cutaways '...(technical  film speak lol) which were far easier, and less stressful........for me anyway, and before I could say 'Supercallifragalisticexpeallidocious' we were done!

The whole process took just under 2 hours, and I can honestly say it was one of the most exciting things I've done in business.

Corporate videos are now a large component in visitor engagement for websites, and a key search engine optimisation criteria so I would recommend this experience, and the end product to all Oxfordshire businesses. It doesn't need to be stressful, it doesn't need to be expensive, and the end result is a corporate video which helps website visitors engage further with your business.

Question

What would be your main business or personal reason for not having a corporate video on your website?

Lots of business owners in Oxfordshire say to me that their website is not working for them, yet when asked if they measure the traffic or use a tool such as Google Analytics, the answer is usually ‘I don’t know’ or ‘I think I have login’.

Now in my opinion many Oxfordshire companies websites do not work for them in identifying marketing validation, are not generating enough business leads, or attracting the right kind of traffic.  However, as with any form of business development, or marketing, measuring is absolutely critical, so that businesses can assess what is working, what is not working and adjust strategies accordingly.

Unfortunately some businesses do not measure their web traffic at all. This may because they are unaware that tools such as google analytics are actually FREE, and that this service can be provided by outsourced companies.

The most common uses of Google Analytics are probably checking on how much traffic a website receives, the source of the traffic, and which keyword someone has typed, if they have arrived via a search engine.  Glooo recently spoke to a potential client who had visitor number details but no corporate details so wasn't getting the maximum feedback from the data from their site.

Google Analytics however can provide so much more relevant and useful information, for example,

‘Bounce Rate’ can be a very important piece of data, this means the percentage of single page visits where the visitor left your site from the landing page without continuing to view any other pages of the site. So you might have lots of traffic, but if your bounce rate is high then this would suggest the page is not relevant to visitors and your site is probably not working for you. Conversely, this may be the very page your specific campaign is targeting. In this case the ‘bounce rate’ should not be discouraging.

'Top Exit' pages can be another great piece of information, if visitors are browsing various pages of your site, but you are losing them without receiving enquiries then you may need to review your top exit pages and try tweaking/improving these.

However coming from a business development background the key metric for Glooo (and the raison d'etre for the forming of the company) is the 'service provder' metric which delivers the Corporate information of businesses visiting client sites. This information is key for the proactive process of business development in that it delivers a) a confirmed business source and b) and indication of the interest of that visitor. Which in turns mean you can contact the opportunity in the knowledge of tailoring information and conversations to exact requirements.