In the fight for credit crunch business, grabbing the attention of your target audience can be extremely difficult. To paraphrase Alick in his previous post – A website is just the beginning – you can’t just hope for online business to find you.

The solution? An integrated business blog and subscribable RSS feed, like our very own miggleblog. An inexpensive, simple tool, it can give you direct access to millions of prospective customers worldwide.

The benefits of a blog:

Reach more people, and make money
The likelihood is that only your existing customers will read a news section on your website. With a blog you can reach out and find new prospects. Google’s Feedburner is an invaluable tool that can help you publicise your RSS feed content and make it easier for people to subscribe. By participating in the FeedBurner Ad Network, you can make money from your pearls of wisdom.

Build customer relations
It’s far harder to get business from new customers than it is to get more business from your existing customers, so keeping in touch should be one of your top priorities. An interactive blog is a friendly and fun way to keep your existing customers up-to-date with all your new offers and products, so that your business will be at the forefront of their mind when they need your products or services again.

Better search engine rankings
The migglemedia team always recommend that a business blog be hosted on the main business website, as the more people that read your blog and link to posts on it, the higher your website will appear in the search engine rankings.

Bring in more traffic
Google search loves frequently updated websites, therefore a blog can bring in a surprising amount of new traffic to your website through natural search terms. Blog posts are rapidly indexed by the major search engines and can be extremely profitable.

Start a buzz
Blog about your new products, drop hints about forthcoming events, publicise your research – grab the attention of the press! Blogs are increasingly quoted and cited in the mainstream media, and as such are a great way to score free publicity for your company.

Become ‘the guru’
If your business occupies a niche sector of the market, why not share your knowledge via a blog and build a reputation as a go-to person?

Test your ideas
Thinking about a change of direction for the company or expanding into a new range of products? Blog about it and let your customers tell you exactly what they want from your business.

>> How to profit from social media

>> Drive user engagement with a newsletter

Based in the UK’s silicon city – Brighton and Hove, East Sussex, contact miggle.co.uk for website development, content management and online media services in the UK and worldwide.

The online travel industry is an extremely competitive one. Big name brands all compete on the same keywords for the top search rankings on Google’s homepage (as well as on Yahoo! and MSN search), so when The Cooden Beach Hotel, a private hotel in Bexhill, asked us to manage their search marketing, we were up for the challenge.

Firstly, we was asked to redesign their website, which helped because, as with all the websites we build at miggle, SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) is considered throughout the website build process. We identified The Cooden Beach Hotel’s best keywords and prepared website copy both search engine friendly and useful to the user.

The preparation paid dividends. Not long after launching The Cooden Beach Hotel’s website, we were achieving first page search results on our chosen keywords. This in itself was great when you take into account the very competitive market.

So, from a natural search point of view we were doing well. Our selected keywords were ranking the website on the first page of the SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages) but in such a competitive market place you can’t rest on your laurels. Being pro-active is a must in search marketing, so we continued working with The Cooden Beach Hotel to improve their search rankings.

The miggle media team decided to run a PPC (Pay-Per-Click) campaign using Google Adwords, with the aim of achieving maximum exposure in both paid and natural search for The Cooden Beach Hotel.

As mentioned in our previous post, Is Google Adwords right for your business?: “A recent study found that search advertising is still the most cost-effective method of advertising (and it is a fraction of the cost of direct mail, email, online banners or yellow pages), mainly due the fact you can target your market so effectively.”

Our initial aim was to hit the top 3 positions on the Google sponsored ads as often as possible and to drive quality, targeted traffic to the hotel’s booking engine in order to provide a good return on investment (ROI). This has been a great success – now The Cooden Beach Hotel pretty much dominates SERPs on our chosen keywords. The hotel is thrilled with their ROI and have already increased their Google Adwords spend.

The screen grab shows how The Cooden Beach Hotel has the whole page covered giving them the best opportunity to gain clicks, and hopefully bookings. A very successful search marketing campaign.

The following guides you through the screen grab (left):
1) This is one of our Google Adwords ads – competing with some huge brand names means your ads and landing pages need to have a high quality score and be extremely relevant to the search.

2) Local business listing – essential for any business to get listed here and as you can see, can give good exposure. It’s also free to submit your listing!

3) This is the natural search listing – ranked in second place for this keyword. It’s also worth noting that the website link on the first place listing goes to a page which in turn links to the hotel making it another valuable source of clicks.

If you’re interested in search marketing, contact the miggle media team to find out how we can optimise your online presence.

Based in the UK’s silicon city – Brighton and Hove, East Sussex, contact miggle.co.uk for website development, content management and online media services in the UK and worldwide.

Internet advertising in Britain was the only ad medium to grow in 2008, rising 17 percent and bucking the overall 3.5 percent industry fall, according to the latest reports.

The reasons? Pay-per-click and online display advertising offer businesses what TV, radio, mail and press simply can’t – total accountability, the flexibility to adjust and test advertising messages in real time and pinpoint targeting of your desired audiences.

There are millions of places on the internet where you can buy advertising and lots of different ways you can do it. Advertising comes down to two things – you’re either building your brand or you want to elicit some direct response. There are distinct strategies for both.

In terms of building brand – it’s important to establish what kind of websites have a commercial offering that’s right for you and a relevant audience. You could buy an ad on the front page of Yahoo! and reach many millions of people from all walks of life – it’ll be priced accordingly. But you may find that there are websites that cost less and work better, helping you to access a relevant niche audience.

The migglemedia team can advise you on where you should advertise, what your mix of branded and direct spend should be, bargain advertising opportunities and how to design compelling creative.

Based in the UK’s silicon city – Brighton and Hove, East Sussex, contact miggle.co.uk for website development, content management and online media services in the UK and worldwide.

Google Adwords pay-per-click search results are shown above 'organic' search results

As most people who use a computer connected to the internet know, Google is where the world goes to find information on the internet, but Google also offer a relatively cheap way to promote your business.

Google Adwords is a form of PPC (pay per click) advertising – you only pay when users click through to your website, no matter how often your advert is displayed.

With Google AdWords, the idea is that you reach your customers at the precise moment they’re looking for your products or services. When users search on Google, they’re demonstrating which products they’re interested in. Potential customers will see your ad displayed above or next to relevant search results. In addition, your ads could appear on relevant search and content sites within the Google Network.

Google Adwords’ precise targeting and your ability to control how much you’re willing to pay per click can mean a higher return on investment (ROI) for your advertising budget.

A recent study found that search advertising is still the most cost-effective method of advertising (and it is a fraction of the cost of direct mail, email, online banners or yellow pages), mainly due the fact you can target your market so effectively.

However don’t think that Google Adwords is the answer to all your marketing prayers. It’s still very easy to get wrong unless done properly and this could end up costing your business. If your not careful, and on top of your campaigns and your campaign goals, your in danger of wasting your time and money.

The migglemedia team manage Google Adwords accounts for many clients from a variety of industries. Get in touch with us on 0845 094 8443 to see how we can help you improve your online marketing ROI.

Find out more:
> Pay per click advertising with migglemedia

Based in the UK’s silicon city – Brighton and Hove, East Sussex, contact miggle.co.uk for website development, content management and online media services in the UK and worldwide.