So we seemed to have survived another Christmas, despite a raging flu-pandemic that has hit most of Ireland. So next up is New Years and the start of 2009 - a year many are predicting to be an economic free-fall, which it will possibly be. A lot of people who have spent the last few years in senior, management and professional careers are now seeing an opportunity to setup their own company. Also, the government has this new businss incentive for start-ups which should prove interesting.
The next step most people seem to take after coming up with the idea is to setup a new website. Having hindsight and experience, I would always advise setting up a website and SEO ahead of starting to trade. Once you're sure the business venture is a runner - set up the website without hesitation.
Websites need time and maturity to help them with SEO - setting up a website after you start trading gives you a slight disadvantage. There is nothing wrong with setting up a site before you're ready to trade - chances are nobody will find it for the first few months - but the longer the Search Engines Index your site, the easier it gets to optimise it!
Friday, December 26, 2008
Thursday, December 18, 2008
Saving money with O2
We recently moved to O2. We had several good reasons.
Well, it's not. And a lot of our business friends have higher costs. We moved to O2, got iphones for everyone for €50 and our bill is coming in at €90 per head. Ok, that's only after 2 months, to be fair, but it is a substantial drop.
My advice - whoever you're with - you could save money by moving simply because your existing network won't actually get you a better deal. They could look at your spend over the last 6 months and tell you which package would have cost you less but they won't....so we moved and we're delighted.
BTW - if you didn't know already- the iPhone rocks. It's more than a gadget. Its a necessity. The App store, accelerometer, browsing capabilities. Even people with the LG "iPhone killer" version readily admit the iPhone is a lot more intuitive, capable and feature packed.
What do you get:
- Vodafone were costing us a fortune - up to €200 per user
- O2 have the iPhone
- Vodafone were costing us a fortune no matter what plan/add-on combo and they don't have the iPhone.
Well, it's not. And a lot of our business friends have higher costs. We moved to O2, got iphones for everyone for €50 and our bill is coming in at €90 per head. Ok, that's only after 2 months, to be fair, but it is a substantial drop.
My advice - whoever you're with - you could save money by moving simply because your existing network won't actually get you a better deal. They could look at your spend over the last 6 months and tell you which package would have cost you less but they won't....so we moved and we're delighted.
BTW - if you didn't know already- the iPhone rocks. It's more than a gadget. Its a necessity. The App store, accelerometer, browsing capabilities. Even people with the LG "iPhone killer" version readily admit the iPhone is a lot more intuitive, capable and feature packed.
What do you get:
- Global Positioning Satellite (GPS) with Google Maps
- an iPod
- YouTube
- Touch Screen
- Accelerometer (detects motion in the handset, like a Wii. Has Wii like games too)
- Millions of apps to download
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
Hmmmm.....the 'R' word
The 'R' word is back and with a vengeance. R is an important letter in ROI - Return on Investment. If a website is the most important tool of the modern age, then surely search engine optimisation is the most important tool in increasing the return on that investment.
I still find it hard to accept that so many business still don't see that having a site and not having a plan for building traffic means that no matter how much was invested in the original site, the site has, almost no value. It's not until SEO or SEM comes along that the site begins to add value - to both the domain and the business itself. For many companies, particularly those with a smart multiple domain strategy, the domain and website have an asset value of their own, aside from that of the owning company.
I've heard this too many times: "But we're the best supplier of cakes in Dublin. We're supposed to come up number one. Everyone knows that!" Yip, try telling that to Google though! No, really, you should tell Google and that's what SEO and SEM are for!
I also can't believe that so many companies believe that they can compete with strong websites, particularly national or even international players by paying someone €1,000.00 or so as an "investment" in their website! That's not an investment, it's a moderately priced flyer.
Your website doesn't inherit or mirror you're business' real life presence on the internet. When you adopt a full, proper internet development programme, you are essentially opening an Internet based business of sorts.
You need to therefore be aware of things like Blogs, Social Media (for connecting you and your associates, partners and clients in a business and social network) as well as SEO and SEM.
Why do I think SEO delivers better as a value-add over any other form of advertising ? A well optimised site that continues to grow with unique, original and infomrative content will continue to grow traffic, generate leads and grow your business. Far better than any paid advertising.
Paid Advertising requires a constant budget - stop paying and you kill your traffic, leads, sales and business. A well optimised site will continue to grow. You'll get free traffic. You'll get people "clicking" into you and you'll sell. Your site can be sold as a going business asset of it's own right!
I still find it hard to accept that so many business still don't see that having a site and not having a plan for building traffic means that no matter how much was invested in the original site, the site has, almost no value. It's not until SEO or SEM comes along that the site begins to add value - to both the domain and the business itself. For many companies, particularly those with a smart multiple domain strategy, the domain and website have an asset value of their own, aside from that of the owning company.
I've heard this too many times: "But we're the best supplier of cakes in Dublin. We're supposed to come up number one. Everyone knows that!" Yip, try telling that to Google though! No, really, you should tell Google and that's what SEO and SEM are for!
I also can't believe that so many companies believe that they can compete with strong websites, particularly national or even international players by paying someone €1,000.00 or so as an "investment" in their website! That's not an investment, it's a moderately priced flyer.
Your website doesn't inherit or mirror you're business' real life presence on the internet. When you adopt a full, proper internet development programme, you are essentially opening an Internet based business of sorts.
You need to therefore be aware of things like Blogs, Social Media (for connecting you and your associates, partners and clients in a business and social network) as well as SEO and SEM.
Why do I think SEO delivers better as a value-add over any other form of advertising ? A well optimised site that continues to grow with unique, original and infomrative content will continue to grow traffic, generate leads and grow your business. Far better than any paid advertising.
Paid Advertising requires a constant budget - stop paying and you kill your traffic, leads, sales and business. A well optimised site will continue to grow. You'll get free traffic. You'll get people "clicking" into you and you'll sell. Your site can be sold as a going business asset of it's own right!
Monday, December 8, 2008
New PrimaryPosition.com launched
We're delighted to announce the official website for SEO Ireland, www.primaryposition.com. We've been working on it a while and even though I'd like to get more done with it, there's a lot to be said for getting it up and running!
Tomorrow/this week I plan to post about why people should be investing more in their web infrastructure - websites, booking forms, new content and SEO - during the upcoming recession we've all heard so much about.
We've also been doing a lot of work doing some SEO for hotels site, GlobalHotels-24-7.com. Like booking a hotel in Amsterdam, a hotel in Barcelona or for hotels Dusseldorf
Tomorrow/this week I plan to post about why people should be investing more in their web infrastructure - websites, booking forms, new content and SEO - during the upcoming recession we've all heard so much about.
We've also been doing a lot of work doing some SEO for hotels site, GlobalHotels-24-7.com. Like booking a hotel in Amsterdam, a hotel in Barcelona or for hotels Dusseldorf
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