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Top 10 Layman’s Tips to Improve Your Website

For your Business website to perform well and bring you the prospects, customers and sales you want, it needs to be useful, (serve a purpose), usable, (easy to use), and engaging, (enjoyable to use). To accomplish this, the most important things to focus on are: attractive and functional navigation, layout and design, search engine optimisation, good copy aimed at your target audience, and reliable hosting. The following are quick tips to help improve your website:

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Quick Tips: Content Ideas for Email Marketing Campaigns

One of the most common questions from companies engaged in Email Marketing is “Help! What do I write about in my email campaigns?” While they are the subject experts on their products and services, the secret is to ‘package’ the ‘story’ in a way that their customers want to hear, and follow some simple time [...]

Business Bytes

• September 3, 2010 at 9:09

  Portaltech and PayPal have partnered to help retailers offer their customers a fast and secure checkout experience on mobile devices. The move comes shortly after PayPal released its Mobile Express Checkout – a mobile optimised version of its Express Checkout service.

  Mark Adams, Sales Director at Portaltech explains: “As Smartphone adoption increases and mCommerce becomes more important to Portaltech and our retail clients, we recognised the need to expand the payment options on our QuickLive mCommerce solution and to find a quick and easy payment solution for end customers that would make payment via mobile, convenient, seamless and secure.”

  Source: internetretailing.net

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• September 2, 2010 at 11:30

  Apple has launched Ping, a social media service that ties into iTunes, allowing users to follow musicians and friends. Ping will be tied into Apple’s next update for iTunes software and will allow users to follow musicians and friends and receive information, such as what music they are listening to or what concerts they attending, in a stream similar to Facebook or Twitter.

  The service, available immediately, can also be accessed via the iPhone and iPod Touch ranges. The network’s privacy settings let people choose whether they want to allow anyone to follow them or only those they approve.

  Source: marketingweek.co.uk

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• September 1, 2010 at 9:23

  Orange has finally rolled out its High Definition Voice technology, with the network promising ‘crystal clear’ call quality. The latest addition to Orange’s service was announced last year, and trials have been ongoing through the summer. The launch was penned in for late summer, and the network has hit its target, with the service arriving on 1 September.

  HD Voice gets rid of the interference from calls, and should help those people who like to make calls from trains, football grounds, festivals and rock concerts with the technology apparently shining in noisy environments. Orange HD Voice is available for free to all Orange mobile customers who take a HD Voice enabled handset with the Nokia 5230, Nokia X6, Nokia E5 and Samsung Omnia Pro all HD Voice enabled at launch and further manufactures expected to offer HD handsets in the coming months.

  Source: techradar.com

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• August 27, 2010 at 8:46

  Full-length movies are available on YouTube in the UK for the first time following a deal between Google and Blinkbox. YouTube has launched a Movies section featuring more than 400 ad-supported and on-demand titles, including Bollywood, comedy and classic titles such as Ken Loach’s Cathy Come Home and Animal Farm. Google is looking to extend the catalogue in the near future. YouTube has a similar service in the US with MGM, Lionsgate and Sony Pictures.

  Source: nma.co.uk

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• August 26, 2010 at 10:39

  Video-on-demand ad creativity is key to the sector’s growth, according to broadcasters, after the first new media age internet TV audience survey revealed almost two-thirds of people (62%) find ads on video-on-demand services intrusive.

  The survey, conducted by Lightspeed Research ahead of this week’s Edinburgh TV festival, sampled 4,378 people’s internet TV viewing habits. Almost three-fifths (58%) had streamed or downloaded TV within the last six month, 45% of whom said they watch or download TV content at least once a week.

  The ad-free BBC iPlayer is the most popular platform, with 86% of people having used it, followed by ITV Player (43%), Channel 4’s 4oD (36%), YouTube (34%) and Demand Five (15%).

  Source: nma.co.uk

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• August 24, 2010 at 8:23

  Just four out of the top 20 most frequently visited retailer websites are presently optimised for mobile, and only eight of the top 20 have any kind of mobile application for smartphones, despite the fact that each month in the UK, a staggering 4.2 million consumers are visiting retailers’ websites using the mobile internet, finds a study by the Association for Interactive Media and Entertainment (AIME), the Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB) and the Interactive Media in Retail Group (IMRG).

  However, while this may show that too few retailers have a solid mobile presence today, 41% plan to have a transactional mobile site or application in place within the next year, according to the study.

  eDigital Research, commissioned by AIME, the IAB and the IMRG surveyed 140 marketing professionals from the retail, advertising and mobile service provider sectors in the UK to understand attitudes, behaviours and perceived challenges to mobile commerce. Over half (59%) of the senior-level representatives from UK retail brands that took part expected their mobile revenues to increase over the next 12 months, and 94% saw it as a real opportunity for their business.

  Source: internetretailing.net

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• August 20, 2010 at 9:06

  Online spenders spent £5bn in July, according to the latest IMRG Capgemini e-Retail Sales Index. Britons spent an average of £81 each in a month that saw spending rise by 14% compared to the previous month as shoppers responded to sales promotions. Spending grew by 18% compared to last July.

  The biggest areas of growth were in accessories (up by 64% compared to the same time last year), lingerie (31%), gifts (26%), and travel (18%). The growth in travel sales was put down to heavy discounting on holidays, together with poor weather at home.

  Once again multichannel retailers outshone their pureplay rivals, growth by 18% compared to the online-only retailers’ 8%. Multichannel sellers also converted more browsers into sales, with a conversion rate of 4.49% compared to 4.35% for online-only retailers.

  Source: internetretailing.net

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• August 19, 2010 at 12:53

  Media consumption is on the up because Britons are increasingly using more than one type of communications device at the same time, according to a study. Ofcom says consumers are spending almost half their day (7 hours) watching television, surfing the internet, emailing or using their mobile phone.

  Simultaneous use of different kinds of media means that Britons are able to cram almost 9 hours of media into just seven hours of the average day, the broadcast regulator’s “Communications Market Report” finds. Media multi-tasking now accounts for one fifth (20%) of all media consumed throughout the day, the report claims.

  This increased juggling of media types is being driven by the young, with almost a third (29%) of 16-24 year-olds multi-tasking, compared to just 12% of people aged 55+. Peter Phillips, Ofcom partner for strategy and market developments, says the increasing popularity of smartphones is helping drive increased media consumption.

  Source: marketingweek.co.uk

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• August 19, 2010 at 10:17

  Facebook has launched its location-based service Facebook Places. The service, initially available only in the US and on the iPhone or via a mobile browser, will allow people to check-in at places, much like Gowalla or Foursquare.

  People can create Places based on their locations for people to check-in at, and businesses can claim locations where they’re based. Users can also tag other people in a location if they’re with them, in the same way people tag photos or status updates on the social network. When you’re at a location, a People Here Now function lets you see who else has checked in.

  Facebook plans to offer location features through its Graph API and is already working with other location services such as Gowalla, Foursquare, Yelp and Booyah to integrate the functionality of Places.

  Source: nma.co.uk

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• August 18, 2010 at 10:52

  Just four out of the top 20 most frequently visited retailer websites are presently optimised for mobile, and only eight of the top 20 have any kind of mobile application for smartphones, despite the fact that each month in the UK, a staggering 4.2 million consumers are visiting retailers’ websites using the mobile internet, finds a study by the Association for Interactive Media and Entertainment (AIME), the Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB) and the Interactive Media in Retail Group (IMRG).

  However, while this may show that too few retailers have a solid mobile presence today, 41% plan to have a transactional mobile site or application in place within the next year, according to the study.

  Source; internetretailing.net

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