Net Visuals Web Design

Updated Logo & New Website

2011-09-05T16:06:00.002+01:00

It's been a while since I posted some content on the business blog. We're busy, very busy, and I am sure its just the start of something good for us.

Our website was out of date, cluttered and we needed a fresh direction and we've created something we think is really attractive, current and informative.

Please have a look and give us your feedback (if you want!).

The new Net Visuals website - Bespoke Web Design.

Ambassador Of The Day

2011-06-15T15:45:00.001+01:00

We're promoting Scotland and this area nationally, investing in us for the future is key to our areas sustainability and business success in the future with our distance selling and marketing.

Check out the Great Exhibition 2012 - Me and my brand - North West Tourism ( www.northwesttourism.co.uk ) are AMBASSADOR OF THE DAY promoting such items nationwide as Loch Fyne, Tarbert and even Haggis!!

Take A Look Today Only - http://www.thegreatexhibition2012.co.uk/ and check out what were promoting here all the time - http://www.thegreatexhibition2012.co.uk/users/nick-0

Regional Tourism Concerns Highlighted

2011-03-31T06:20:00.002+01:00

We work with many businesses reliant on tourism throughout Argyll and have been involved in developing and delivering public tourism events for a number of years so we know just how important tourism is and what's needed for attration, delivery, businesses and consumers.

What we do know is that like employment and other national and international problems, tourism is not going to escape significant changes. It's at times like these that we all endeavour to try something different to capture new business or cut costs. With websites though.. you pretty much get what you pay for, so scrimping and saving is not the best way forward for web businesses, particularly tourism related, certainly as competition increases this is potentially detrimental.

It should be clear by now if you have a business that relies on tourism for its majority business you must know your customer, understand your customer and reach your customer because as visitors to Scotland decline there are significantly less to go around, you only have to look at Visit Scotland's imposed budget cut of 6% earlier this year for evidence of that. It could be argued as tourism declines further investment should be made to support the increasing number of accommodation providers and tourist businesses, with uk destinations such as the Lake District and of course the ever popular Cornwall, not to mention other reviving destinations its never been more important to brand and sell a destination along with businesses within it.

Making Tourism Work For You & What You Need

There are several key things you need to do to make tourism work for you;

Ensure your business website is current and changes regularly

We recommend you (or your web developer is asked) to make changes to your website at least every 3 months. The minimum you should do is add new photos or little snippets of interesting and related information.
Investigate your local tourism websites

Get on Google, Yahoo and Bing and fnd out where your website is for related key word terms, if it doesnt appear in the first two pages you need to look at your website to make some changes and also consider online marketing.
Online marketing

There are thousands of websites to choose from so you need to be careful in where you advertise, not only for inbound links, but also for reaching your customers. Websites with short and concise names are usually best, for instance if you are looking for Self Catering in Argyll in a search you should see www.argyllselfcatering.net appear, this is an example of effective keyword target marketing - miss out at your peril!
Look at regional marketing groups

Grant funding seems to have all but dried up and there is an implied necessity to work as a team to sustain business in rural areas but contributing to tourism initiatives, so look around to see if there is anyone or any businesses in the area actively marketing your tourist region on various levels - county, region, town or village, business type - if there isn't anyone doing this you should consider starting something - dozens of places all over Scotland currently do this.
The days of walk in custom have gone

Now people can virtually see all destinations and businesses online - if a place isnt online, it doesn't mean there is an area shrowded in mystery and intrigue, it is highly likely that its not worth visiting - so unless your locale has a magnificent web presence there is a chance potential custom can be lost, invest in your local websites... its the future!

That's the tip of the iceberg but highlights a few initial important steps in investigating and taking action to ensure your business and the businesses around you are able to be sustainable and continue to attract visitors, particularly in the staycation market which is a key layer in regional economic activity.

We specialise in accommodation websites and tourism portals (such as www.kintyre.org) which can help your area tremendously but remember... a handful of subscribers will only get a handful of marketing and development.. that moves us onto business ethics which will be in our next post.

If you need assistance with websites, online marketing and other related services why not contact us for a no commitment discussion or quote.

Your Website Is Your Shop Window

2011-03-08T08:17:00.004Z

How often have you walked down the high street and looked in a shop window only to see the same products and layout as last month, and in some cases last year?

Does it attract you to go in?
Does it give you the opinion that business is successful and turning over stock?
Do you get the opinion that that business is passionate and involved in what they do?

The answer to all these questions is probably no, and if it isn't then it should be!

Well the same applies to your website, when was the last time you had some changes made? How old are the photos on your website? Do you have a new product or updated your accommodation and not informed your web developer?

We live, work, and participate in an incredibly technologically driven dynamic society. Everything is on demand, consumers require much more for their money, and some people check websites daily for new content, price updates and more.

Remember, your website is your shop window, if you dont keep it current, up-to-date, and relaying the latest news and information about your products and services you just may end up losing customers to someone else who does!

A Couple Of Handy Tips

Watch your competitors.
When they make changes, you should consider updating yours.

New Season, New Content
If its a new season, such as the start of Spring, its a great time to make changes to reflect the new season, or to refresh content. Spring is an ideal time for tourism based businesses to make a large update.

Big Business, Big Changes
If you have a larger business, or larger number of products you should make changes much more frequently than smaller businesses. Always invest a proportion of income to keep your website current, developing, and growing!

Be Creative
It's not always easy to be creative and find new reasons to communicate with your customers but its good practice, rewarding to try and enjoyable. Take elements of what you enjoy about your business and sell it to your customers.

Web Sponsorship Works

2011-02-25T08:19:00.002Z

You might think that the additional expense associated with sponsorship of regional websites is not worth it, however evidence has shown that main sponsors of websites can attract as much as 50% more web traffic and potential enquiries than smaller adverts.

For that to work, the sponsor / advertiser needs to be relevant not only to the website but also to the current target audience, at the same time present a product that will generate a more diverse demographic in future marketing.

At Net Visuals Bespoke Web Design we operate dozens of regional websites that provide targeted lead traffic for your business. Each website focuses on a particular product - such as our Loch Fyne Hotels website - or a specific geographic region - such as our Kintyre, Tarbert and Loch Fyne tourism information websites.

The reason why they work, and are important to you are quite simple;

1) The website is product or location specific

That is, each website becomes listed and used because it appears when it matches, appropriate consumer searches. Type in Kintyre and see where Kintyre.org appears.

2) The content is relative and appropriate

The content of these websites is relevant, unique and has appropriate content. This enhances the website and helps consumers know they have found a useful resource of an official capacity.

3) The website is designed to enhance advertising

Each of our websites is designed with the inclusion of branding and marketing in mind, so that when you attach your sponsorship to the site you know it is going to increase your web traffic and potential enquiries.

If you have a large tourism or hospitality based business you may benefit from the additional exposure that site sponsorship can provide, for more information or to discuss a sponsorship partnership with any of our websites please email or telephone us.

FREE Kintyre Business Advice

2011-01-31T17:57:00.002Z

How do you use the web for success in Kintyre? What are the most important things you should be doing to evaluate your internet presence? How do you make sure your accommodation or business is visible? How should you evaluate consumer demand?

All these questions and more are answered in our January Tips PDF.

Loch Fyne Hotels

2011-01-30T19:14:00.003Z

Besides providing a full bespoke web design and technical consultancy service, Net Visuals also develops and manages powerful tourism websites that enable not only our clients to maximise marketing, but also allow new customers and regional businesses to attract new customers.

I've found that many users of search engines type in two or three different search terms before they find a website that they will use, or that represents a level of trust. So in order to make sure your business stands the highest probability of a conversion you are required to predict the future a little bit.

An example of search engine behaviour in looking for a hotel in Loch Fyne might go something like this;

- Choose a search engine (80% of people will use Google)
- Choose a keyword you are looking for. Start with Loch Fyne.
- What if that doesn't work? Why not try Accommodation in Loch Fyne.
- Brevity is normal for regular search engine users, next would be Loch Fyne Hotels
- or reversed to Hotels Loch Fyne

Type in these keywords and see if your hotel appears amongst the top ten websites or on a website in the top 10 for each keyword term? No? Then you could be missing out on considerable business.

According to Google around 90,000 people per calendar month search for Loch Fyne, around 5,400 search for Loch Fyne Hotels, with a further 200 people searching for Loch Fyne accommodation.

Loch Fyne Hotels
We have created a website to allow hotels in the Loch Fyne area to reach those search engine customers and capitalise on this potential business.

Visit Lochfynehotels.com for more information.

We also have our primary tourism website for Loch Fyne at Lochfyne.info and our additional Lochfyneaccommodation.com website under development to complete this keyword coverage.

If you have a B&B in Loch Fyne you may wish to keep an eye out for our Lochfynebedandbreakfast.com website, and self caterers look out for Lochfyneselfcatering.com.

Become a Net Visuals Bespoke Web Design customer and receive 25% off of advertising in the Nocturnal Indulgence or North West Tourism website collections.

New! Customer Control Panel

2011-01-19T16:24:00.005Z

Wouldn't it be great if there was a way of managing your website data, domain names, invoicing and online marketing all from one simple control panel? That's what we thought too, so we've been developing a control panel called Navigator which we'll be launching next month.

Navigator is a simple to use centralised control panel with some great features;

Update your website at home or on your mobile device from anywhere

Upload private documents and files to your business cloud to access anywhere

Upload and share documents and files with your colleagues and the public

Manage and renew invoices through a simple to use interface

Manage your advertising and marketing across dozens of great websites

Purchase domains, new web services and install website features

Learn from exclusive tutorials and web experience articles

All this and more will be available via a password protected login, so Net Visuals Bespoke Web Design customers and advertising customers on websites such as Tarbertlochfyne.com and Kintyre.org can add and manage page listings at the click of a button and update content throughout the year.

We'll keep you updated on developments over the following weeks. There is no better place to be right now than with Net Visuals, the future is very bright!

Prosperity & Success In 2011

2011-01-05T13:20:00.001Z

We would like to wish all our existing and new customers great success and prosperity in 2011. Have a great year!

A Very Happy Christmas From Net Visuals

2010-12-24T08:01:00.002Z

I would like to take this opportunity to thank all customers old and new for ongoing business, patience and support for our products and services. Our knowledge, talent and experience is slowly being recognised as one of the most forward thinking and modern web developers in the area and we're very happy you're with us.

We hope you have a safe and happy Christmas.

Best Wishes

Net Visuals Bespoke Web Design

Measures Of Website Success

2010-11-30T10:37:00.003Z

When analysing and measuring the success of your website it is important to cover a number of important aspects. For the best answer, ask your customers.

Direct Email Enquiries
Enquiries can take two direct forms, either by an enquiry form placed on your website or an email link which brings up a new email in their program. The first you can quantify as the email will identify it came from a particular website, the second however cannot be measured in the same way.

What that means is that for any direct email from a customer could be as a result of looking at your website or a referral from another site.

Indirect Email Enquiries
Indirect enquiries are emails that are sent through third party websites, booking tools, or via email links. Again this is difficult to determine statistically and presents the same issues as direct enquiries.

Telephone Enquiries
The enquiry or booking via telephone is a difficult one, sometimes a person will tell you where they saw you, or that they have been to your website. You will need to ask them where they found you to get the best analytical information.

Remember, just because someone doesnt send you an enquiry through your form doesnt mean that your website isnt working well, many people use direct email not using these forms, and many still prefer to use the telephone. Product sales are the key baseline here including overall enquiries.

Summary
In summary, ask your customers, they are the only ones that will provide you with information and whats on their mind, once the information is collated present it to your web developer and then implement changes so that it meets the needs and solves any problems highlighted by your customers.

Always ask where your customer found you, and if you are told 'the web' ask them where on the web.. it makes a huge difference!

Google SEO For Website Owners

2010-11-23T19:34:00.002Z

If you have often wondered what goes into search engine optimisation or SEO as its known in the industry then you should have a look at the following document.

The PDF (which will open in your browser window) is Google's introduction to SEO for webmasters and website owners and goes through alot of the elements of what you should look for not only when you have your own website created, but even when you ask for links from other people's websites what your link should say as that's important too!

Skim through the following GOOGLE SEO document at your leisure.

Remember, we can provide a full website SEO and drill right down to every keyword, tag and paragraph dynamically to help create a powerful search based website, why not enquire about our dynamic SEO subscription post web design.

SEO. Who's responsibility?

2010-11-23T13:15:00.003Z

While there are many businesses that provide SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) either as their core product or service, or as part of their overall business services, who's responsibility actually is SEO?

SEO Is A Shared Responsibility Between You And Your Developer!

As we move towards a more electronically focused way of finding everything, search engines are a key part of that movement. For your SEO expert to maximise your business online he (or she) needs as much information from you as possible including key phrases used within your business industry. At the same time your developer has to analyse your data and further research to look at possible SEO options for your websites. If you are not providing information to your developer, you cannot expect them to provide you with the best SEO, instead you are likely to get a generic SEO that is used by everyone else - yes it will work, but not excel.

Nobody Understands Your Business As Well As You!

There are a multitude of different aspects in creating the perfect website, but 99% of the time no developer or SEO expert will know your business as well as you. What are your busiest months? What are your best products? What are your best selling points? What do you call your products? Who are your best buyers? Where do your buyers live? Why do they buy from you? Only you can answer these questions with sufficient detail to be able to make SEO work for you. Remember electronic means on demand, you have to be proactive and report often.

I Had SEO Completed Once But My Website Doesnt Rank Well?

About three or four years ago, you could create a website and pack it full of keywords and crack the top 10 of Google, today however is a completely different story. When your site is submitted it is analysed, sandboxed, compared to other websites and can take up to 8 weeks before it's even seen by major search engines, and even then it can have a low ranking. Existing websites are also impacted by changes which means that size, length of time online, amount of updates, inbound quality links and regular changes can make the difference between top 10 and top 100. And how many other websites have been added in your business category in 4 years and how much do they spend on their website and SEO?

SEO is now a dynamic requirement responding to events and using information before your competitors to maximise traffic, links, markup, and new technologies. If you do not have an ongoing SEO contract you should consider one.

Net Visuals Bespoke Web Design offers an ongoing site maintenance, SEO, and social networking management subscription as part of your website aftercare from October 2010 so that your web portfolio can remain competitive and change often.

Website Links & Email Link Requests

2010-11-16T06:33:00.002Z

Linking with other people's websites is a key part of what helps assist or direct visitors to find and buy products and services from key businesses, but also plays a considerable part of search engine optimisation.

It's no secret that having more inbound links than outbound links can increase your websites performance in search engines, but there are a few key points which are important when building a link strategy.

1)Links From Small Sites Are Worthless
Inbound links from higher authorities will give your website link weight and therefore increase the importance of your site with search engines, so a link from Tarbertlochfyne.com as number 1 in Google is much better than Tarbertlochfyne.co.uk (which is not at all associated with Net Visuals! a cheap copy).

2)Relevant Links Are Helpful
Links that are relevant provide better linkweight, but also on a level of common sense linking with local websites will often provide a higher conversion rate than national sites or large directories.

3)Reciprocals Are Helpful
Reciprocal links are a handshake with other endorsed businesses and normal practise, you should be building up a set of links with websites and businesses and asking for reciprocal links.

4)Premium Web Links Are Essential
Alot of premium websites like Kintyre.org or Tarbertlochfyne.com rarely provide reciprocal links or outbound links, this is partly due to the commercial nature of the websites and the significant link value that they contain. You should subscribe to advertising on these websites to make the most of the links weight.

5)Choose An Advert? Choose The Home Page!
Home page adverts are essential. If you are advertising on a website, always go for the home page first, why? The home page of any website receives the highest sustained number of visitors and therefore the highest potential number of people to see your product or service. Additionally, and more importantly the link weight from a website home page to your site is significantly more than one two or three clicks deep. If you wondered why advertising on the front of a website carried the highest tariff, then now you know!

Some Hints & Tips On Developing Your Link Strategy

1)Obtain links from websites related to your product or service.
2)Obtain links from your suppliers websites and benefit from their marketing.
3)Obtain links from regional websites.
4)Pay for adverts and links on the top regional and product related sites.
5)Link to prominent websites as linking to smaller websites can be damaging.
6)Dead links can cost you search engine positions, cull them!

This represents a small proportion of activity and link strategy theory, however is a good starting point. It can take hours, days, weeks, and months to create and manage a professional and affective link strategy, if you don't have the time then that's why Net Visuals can help you.

One last, and very important tip, do not add links to your website that you receive through businesses or services that you do not know, or are unrelated. For example, we received an email only this morning from greenislandholidays.com with the title link request. These are not for your benefit, but for theirs. Imagine they request 10,000 email link requests by email and everyone links to but dont receive a reciprocal link, thats alot of link weight! That domain would have considerable value and by sending one link to another website can make a huge difference to the position of the site, this is link funneling - it's like concentrating lots of light into a single high powered beam. Even if everyone was still to supply a reciprocal link, this would be detrimental to your website, and this is a practise known as link farming. Notice that you do not get a link to your website first!

Do NOT participate in link farming as it is detrimental to your website and only consider one way outbound links to websites you want to see perform well!

Domains - Who Owns What?

2010-11-12T07:15:00.002Z

It's a popular question, and it has an uncomplicated answer.

Specifically referring to Net Visuals customers, as I can't speak for other businesses and their practice, we adopt industry standard registration.

Registration Of New Domains
When you ask us to register and manage a domain name for you, we register the domain to your personal care or to your business as required. The domain name registered, on completion of payment, becomes your registered property for the duration you register it, such as 2 years which is normal and up to 10 years in some cases.

Regardless of location, or detail stored in the domain name registration records the domain name that you have registered and paid for is your property until expiry.

Exceptions
There are only two exceptions to this registration ruling. If you have registered a domain name and not paid for it, the ownership falls into the hands of the business who has paid for it, so until full payment is received from the date of renewal the domain name belongs to your registrar. Net Visuals, or any business, subject to terms and conditions and continued non-receipt of payment can take ownership of the domain and even sell it, although this is unlikely to happen within a 6 month period with Net Visuals, other businesses may not be so lenient.

The second exception, when you have registered a domain name which is someone elses brand, business or trade mark you may be liable to a dispute from the respective brand or business owner and lose the domain name without compensation. In real terms you cannot register a business name that already exists, the same applies to online registered companies and trade marks, its one and the same.

Domain Name Transfers
Just as we can transfer your domain names to other providers at any time, and normally without charge, you can also transfer domain names into us to manage for you. We encourage our customers to register and manage domains through us, so that they are automatically renewed on expiry, but also to keep everything in one place, its much more efficient to remember one number and one password, rather than half a dozen services by different providers.

In conclusion then, all domain names registered by Net Visuals on behalf of you or your business belongs to you or your business, and while they are paid for and do not constitute a copyright or trademark infringement, then it remains your property for as long as you renew it.

This is a legally binding statement and can be referred to with regard to your domain names.

Net Visuals Service Updates

2010-11-08T17:04:00.002Z

Generating business online is now much more competitive than ever and as businesses start to reduce advertising budgets in favour of online advertising and the use of free tools such as Facebook, the way in which we use the internet to generate custom is changing dramatically.

We're one step ahead, so let us help you with everything you need, here's a quick guide.

1) Advertise locally, regionally, and nationally.

Most people have free links from low traffic websites and put an advert occasionally on a website to support a friend or colleague but it's simply not good enough! Make sure you advertise locally, on your village and town websites, regionally on the area websites and nationally to hit those large numbers e.g. Tarbert, Kintyre, Argyll and Visit Scotland. Look at Google, Yahoo and Bing to see which websites are at the top for key search terms and place names and take advantage of high traffic!

2) Develop your website, change it regularly and inform your customers.

Static websites are no good anymore. You need to change your website front page at least once a month, develop new content and pages at least once every 3 months, and email your customer base at least once every 3 months! You might not have the time, ideas, or knowledge to do any of these, but don't worry - that's what we are here for!

3) Get Facebooking, Blogging & Tweeting

Not everyone uses search engines, alot of people use Facebook, in fact millions of people do every day. If someone follows you on Facebook you will be able to supply them with information directly into their feed. With mobile phones now Facebook and Twitter enabled people are using them hourly! Not sure how to, or where to start, again don't worry - if you havnt got time, we can help develop and manage your social network portfolio. Contact us for more information.

4) Get Analytics

There's no point having a website and not knowing where you're visitors are coming from and how many there are. You could be wasting hundreds of pounds on ineffective advertising. All our websites have Google Analytics installed, so get stuck in and find out where your visitors are from and how many there are! High web traffic doesnt necessarily mean its good, the conversion rate is the key factor.

5) Google Adwords

Google Adwords can increase your web traffic and potential custom quite dramatically, although at a cost from 10 pence per click through to your site. We can assist or manage an adword account for you to help you make the most of your online advertising setting a maximum budget each month.

6) Provide Content

If you have nothing to say, how would people know to buy from you? Local and regional websites are there to promote the area and village directly to your potential customers, send them emails with special offers, new photos of your rooms, interesting snippets and stories about visitors, wildlife and try and make sure these are linked visibly on their websites.

7) Avoid Large Websites

Avoide huge websites. Lots of websites have masses of content, often unrelated, several links deep, and are superceded by content on a daily basis which reduces the importance of your content.

Look local, buy local, support local as these will always provide the important business with the highest conversion rate.

8) Have More Than One Website

Multiple websites can generate great rewards for your business. The sheer number of websites, keywords that you can target, and consumer tastes means that by having a single website you limit your potential customer base.

Consider one or more sites for a large business for more customers!

9) Don't Rely On Visit Scotland and Your Local Council

Arguably it is the responsibility of Visit Scotland and your Local Council to advertise, promote and market your area and tourist destination, however if you are relying on them as business to generate your custom, then don't.

Regional enterprises, organisations, and businesses are largely responsible at to promote and develop tourism in your area, if you do not invest in businesses and local organisations then the long term sustainability of your business is put at risk.

Net Visuals is developing one of the most important tourism development web portfolios in the west of Scotland, advertise, support and be involved to ensure that we keep delivering business to you while Scottish Tourism continues its decline!

Contact Net Visuals For More Bespoke Web Design Advice

We have brand new service subscriptions that can manage your website, your social networking, search engine optimisation and much more besides especially if you do not have the time or understanding, that's what we do, let us help and do it for you.

If you are a business in Tarbert, Kintyre, or other areas of Argyll then you should be thinking about contacting us and letting us take your business forward online proactively.

Don't get left behind, give us a call for a no commitment review of your website.

Brand New Website

2010-11-04T18:23:00.002Z

Please head over to www.netvisuals.co.uk to browse our new business website now our full rebrand is complete.

Net Visuals, if you don't know already, provides a complete bespoke web design service for your business, particularly if you require web design in Argyll and Kintyre.

We offer full bespoke design services, upper and lower tier management including search engine optimisation, even social networking development which is crucial for modern online marketing.

If you would like information about any of our services please do not hesitate to contact us at any time.

Kintyre Way Annual Conference

2010-11-04T11:29:00.003Z

As the appointed web developer of the Kintyre Way and also the new Kintyre.org website we were invited to attend the Annual Conference yesterday for the Kintyre Way, a day that was focused on marketing, promoting your website, and also developing new customers and initiatives for our own businesses and for the Kintyre Way.

We exhibited a fantastic video of some of our photography, video footage from around Kintyre and Argyll and some screenshots of some of our customers for attending as part of an exhibition. You can view the video at www.netvisuals.co.uk/videos/annualconference2010.php

For those that didnt attend, on perhaps the presumption it would be a day talking about walking, grass and changes to the route, missed an interesting, informative and innovative day covering numerous topics that not only will help the Kintyre Way, but it helped members and advertisers understand the amount of work being put in by the directors now and the aims for the future and why it should be part of your standard membership and regional support expenditure.

At Net Visuals we've also been attendanding online webinars working towards a certificate of competence in providing and understanding professional web services and skills to the industry which is sure to help us, and you benefit from our commitment to evolving.

Appointed As Kintyre.org Developers

2010-09-01T20:33:00.002+01:00

We are incredibly proud to announce that Kintyre.org, the official tourism website for Kintyre, has been leased to Net Visuals Web Design UK for a minimum period of 3 years to enable us to develop a fantastic website that will generate visitors and provide up to date information about Kintyre for the future.

The website, established by the old Kintyre Marketing Group and now in care of the Kintyre Way board, has had one basic update during the last 10 years and is now in desperate need of development to sustain and create tourism in Kintyre.

The website is number 1 on Google, Yahoo, Bing and most other search engines for the search term 'Kintyre' and is featured prominently in printed publications such as the Rough Guide To Scotland, combined with many inbound links from websites throughout the internet enhances Kintyre.org's importance as an information provision and tourism development tool.

We aim to develop a professional website that not only will bring it's subscribed businesses significant customer enquiries and subsequent business, but also to provide income to the Kintyre Way to support and partially fund it's activities and marketing.

We will hopefully bring you more news on this fantastic Kintyre development during the next month and contacting businesses throughout Kintyre to be included. Net Visuals will also be exhibiting at the Kintyre Way Conference in November so please come along and meet us and see the wonderful work we do.

A Quick Update

2010-08-29T17:23:00.002+01:00

It doesnt seem almost a year since the last post on this blog, but it's been so busy and with so many projects ongoing it's hardly surprising.

We've been snapping up valuable domains and working on some really brilliant projects and concepts aswell as continuing to support our evolving customer base.

So if you are reading our blog, please accept our apologies and hopefully we'll be able to keep you up to speed over the next few months on what we're doing and giving you some useful information to look after your website.

Argyll Now On Video!

2009-10-11T19:36:00.002+01:00

There are many web sites about Argyll and Kintyre online, many are lacking in quality content or professional appeal but here at Net Visuals we are spending many hours each week developing new and innovative web sites to deliver a competitive edge over other areas of Scotland to stimulate and prevent declining tourism.

The 'youtube' phenomenon has grown and grown over the last couple of years and provides a place for primarily the under 25s to watch and share video content, a lot of which is useless and of no cultural or intelligable benefit. However 'youtube' can be ineffective and unprofessional when it comes to promoting tourism in your area.

Recently, over several months, Net Visuals travelled across Kintyre and Argyll spending hours upon hours taking high definition video footage of many interesting locations, animals, buildings, coastlines and much more to deliver a professional and interesting video resource that may aid tourism. This is still ongoing.

Apart from some old cine footage, every piece of video (shot in High Definition 1080i) was taken by Net Visuals using the latest professional HD video equipment and edited in house with titles and scene transition. This has resulted in a consistent and professional resource.

The web sites to visit are Tarbert.tv, Kintyre Video, and Argyll Video. Additional dedicated video web sites are in development.

It is possible to have some of these video clips available through your web site for a small annual fee, and you can have your business included on these web sites free of charge when you purchase the Net Visuals video service from only £199 + VAT.

Please contact us for more details about this product and getting your business video enabled.

Advertising opportunities for these latest web sites also exist from only £15 + VAT per month. Please contact us for more information.

Search Engine Optimisation

2009-10-11T18:39:00.003+01:00

Everyone wants that top spot on Google, compared to Yahoo, Bing and other popular search engines Google remains King delivering 10 times as much web traffic as its nearest search competitor.

Here is some advice to get to that top spot on Google!

First of all, free web traffic is not the be all and end all, a focused offline marketing strategy directed cleverly toward your target customer demographics can be far more successful, although much of the time is expensive and can cut into profits.

Second of all, ignore all emails that tell you they will get your web site to number one on Google and other search engines, they do not work, the very fact that you have received the email demonstrates they have found you on the internet!

I'll give you an example - I receive emails like that all the time, recently claiming to get my web site www.tarbertlochfyne.com to number 1 on Google. Tarbertlochfyne currently resides at number 2 on Google for the search term Tarbert, and in the top 7 for the search term Loch Fyne, so performing excellently for the key words of my target demographic for that web site. Now, there are several things that I need to do to get to number 1 on Google, and I know exactly what they are (as you will find out from the advice below) but to change the content and site may result in being number 1 on Google for the search term Tarbert, but lower for Loch Fyne or vice versa. More people search for Loch Fyne daily than Tarbert, so this would be detrimental to free traffic, so you see number 1 for one keyword can have an adverse effect on other keywords.

Our advice, of course is to ask for Net Visuals advice, we know exactly what we are doing and have years of experience and an understanding of getting the best for your web site.

So back to how to get your web site high on Google and other search engines.

Step 1 - Choosing your domain name.

You can reserve domain names and get your web site to work in one of two ways. The first way is to reserve a domain name that reflects your business name, so for us www.netvisuals.co.uk means if people search for the two words Net Visuals, this is a direct domain name match and gives us 'bonus points' in the search engine and will give us priority in search.

The second way is to try and capitalise on general searches rather than your business name, for instance we could choose www.webdesignargyll.com with the objective of capturing web traffic of those who search for Web Design Argyll, in the short term this can have its advantages, particularly if competition is low or web traffic searches for this keyword phrase are high, but on the down side this will affect ranking for the search term Net Visuals.

Its a bit of a double edged sword, and both can work well, if you promote your business adequately offline and online through advertising and proactive marketing, then the first way is the best, if you do little advertising or little marketing then the second way may be the best choice, but of course it is dependent of your business and you should contact us to discuss it further.

Here are some tips on reserving your domain names, you should always reserve them with us, we manage them for free and also automatically renew them on your behalf so you do not lose them.

Domain Name Tip Number 1

Always reserve the .com domain name is available, this has two systematic benefits;

1) The domain name is the highest domain name available and if the same site existed on a .com or .co.uk domain name (unless it was local search) the .com will always come higher
2) The .com domain name gives you official dns preference so if your business name was typed in the URL bar on the browser a dns resolution will deliver your web site over any competition with the same name!

Domain Name Tip Number 2

Always reserve the .com domain name AND the .co.uk domain name, it is easy to forget as a customer whether the business has a .co.uk or .com domain name and this ensures that if someone looks for your web site and types it in wrong, for example as a new customer remembering an advert from a magazine they had read a day or two ago, then you will still capture that customer.

Domain Name Tip Number 3

If you are considering having a web package from Net Visuals, in particular the mobile design plus package, reserve the .mobi domain name along with your .com and .co.uk domain name. This ensures you have the right domain names for the future.

Step 2 - Designing your web site

Just uploading PDFs or using large images with no HTML content is no good, and using outdated tools such as Frontpage are no longer acceptable or helpful in delivering an optimized web site. The site has to be designed correctly, with correct HTML tags and using search engine friendly scripts. Only professional developers such as Net Visuals are able to do this.

A further aim of your site is to develop high levels of web traffic, this can be done by providing free content or interactive elements when your web site is designed and should be discussed with your developer.

Step 3 - Writing your content

Your web site must contain your key phrases, up to a certain optimized percentage which is usually about 5 - 7% of total page content. So for instance our web site benefits from the header containing our business name Net Visuals, our business address contains the phrase Net Visuals, and where possible in the main content we also repeat the words Net Visuals. This ensures that our content is optimized for our main search matches.

Step 4 - Promoting your web site

Once you have your domain name, you have written your content and you are satisfied that this should work well with the search engines you need to get it promoted.

There are numerous ways you can do this, and the reason why you must do this is that in order for your web site to be kept high, and ranked high is through high levels of web traffic comparable or higher than your competitors. Relevant and high traffic will get your web site seen.

The first thing is to submit your site to those search engines, occasionally your site may be found and crawled by the robots but it is best not to rely on this and using Net Visuals Web Trafficdriver product is a perfect way to get your web site listed on over 100 top search engines in 6-8 weeks or less.

The second thing is to submit your web site for free links or as part of a strategic online and offline advertising campaign as described in our marketing suggestions further below. This will generate web traffic.

Marketing Your Web Site

People search in particular ways and use particular phrases, for example particularly in the Scottish tourist industry people are likely to find your web site at one of four levels;

1) national - going to the Visit Scotland web site and learning about areas
2) by area - such as Argyll and Bute and browsing Argyll web sites
3) sub area - selecting an area of Argyll and Bute such as Islay, Bute or Kintyre
4) town/village - selecting a destination and viewing sites for that town or village

advertising at each of these levels on web sites is essential as this will bring you web traffic to your web site which has a potential high conversion rate.

You should get as many quality web links as you can, reciprocal links hold less value than solo inbound links, and avoiding web farms (mass link strategies) should be avoided completely.

You should market your site offline, display it on your business materials, in social networking, leaflets, writing articles to local newspapers or relevant magazines. If your business has historical interest that may develop customers, make sure your business is featured in the relevant news titles or web sites.

At least every 3 months you should test the search engines for key phrases that people search for and find out the web sites that are likely to give you traffic, for instance if you have a hotel in Kintre, you need to know the web sites that are delivered when people type in key phrases such as Kintyre Hotel, Kintyre, Tarbert, Machrihanish, Campbeltown, Carradale, Argyll etc and make sure your web site is listed or included for the area, town or village you are in.

This is the basic starting point for getting your web site noticed online by potential and existing customers and should help you generate or improve your current free web traffic. Remember though, on balance you want to advertise but maximize your customer conversions per pound, so getting as much relevant free web traffic may reduce your need to advertise.

How do you know where your web traffic and customers are coming from? The first and most conventional way is to ask your customers where they found you, include a 'where did you find us' field on your contact forms or limit your advertising to specific publications and web sites from year to year, month to month.

The second way is to get Net Visuals to manage your web site, we install the free Google Analytics plug-in and this allows you to see where your web traffic is coming from, how much traffic you have daily, monthly and annually. You are shown what keywords people search for to find your web site, how much is direct traffic (e.g. from adverts offline) or indirect such as search engine or referred from other web sites. It is an incredibly useful tool and we encourage any customer to use it, it is accurate, and removes the possibility of your web designer faking web traffic to your web site!!

Contact us today for more assistance with your web site in an easy way you can understand and that will not cost you a small fortune.

Time To Go Mobile ?

2009-06-20T13:10:00.003+01:00

According to the latest edition of a popular web developer publication, and something that has clearly been gathering momentum over the last couple of years, is the importance and popularity of mobile devices for using the internet. Having your web site or business featured on web sites accessible by mobile phones and devices is becoming increasingly important if not essential.

Where people used to read newspapers, look out of windows or shuffle paperwork on trains and public transport, a complete shift in making the most of our 'spare' time and mobile devices are now an integral part of our day to day life, phones, handsets, consoles and of course the familiar laptops and notebooks.

So what about the figures, well, for a start mobile devices outnumber home personal computers by almost 4 to 1 in the UK, and on average even at home people spend more time online than watching television. This is extraordinary and we predict the ratio is likely to increase further particularly as on demand products such as BBC iPlayer expand and evolve.

Web sites, even today by most developers are just brochure sites aimed at the home computer. Unless you have had a bespoke solution developed it is likely that your web site is incompatible with 95% of mobile devices, and that is the same for most modern and graphically intensive web sites. Mobile web sites are completely different in their resolution, structure and need to be adjusted to optimise any media content. 2010 is going to be a incredibly important year for the internet and mobile computing.

What can I do to make sure my web site is accessible on mobile phones? Well there are numerous solutions available. The first solution, is to ensure that your business is on social networking sites, with Facebook or Twitter being the two most popular and used sites by mobile users today - while this does not make your web site viewable on mobile devices, you can promote your business free of charge on a popular and web compatible platform in a potentially mass marketing environment. The second solution would be to have your web site developed so that it can be displayed on home computers and mobile devices - this is possible but would reduce the impact of your main web site particularly on home computers and not really recommended. The second solution is to have a second web site for your business, so you have one for home computer users and one for mobile device users. This involves having a normal domain name and web site - www.netvisuals.co.uk - but also the proprietory domain name - www.netvisuals.mobi - for mobile web site. The data for both sites can be shared or you can deliver two web sites with two different aims or objectives, such as news delivery, booking system or online shops.

Each of the solutions has its advantages and disadvantages, and these vary from customer to customer. There are also numerous other mobile savvy solutions depending on what industry customers are in.

It is no longer acceptable to have a simple brochure web site and it is no longer sufficient to rely on search engine traffic bringing you customers as competition grows. The Internet has just grown up and has become a proactive business tool, those businesses that are slow to embrace the benefits of mobile web site delivery may lose out considerably.

Contact us about our web products including our new mobile web package!

Stress Kills

2009-04-29T00:31:00.007+01:00

High and sustained levels of stress are damaging.. to our health, it hinders our ability to be creative, it can prevent us thinking clearly and affect our ability to maintain important and trusted business relationships, equally low stress levels and short lengths of exposure to stress can be just as detrimental.

Stress affects us all, if you do not suffer from stress it is likely that at one of your friends or colleagues will. There are even reports of teenagers feeling "stressed" as a result of trying to pass numerous secondary school exams.

Now in in its 6th year of continuous business, Net Visuals is growing, and during the early period of establishment and growth incredibly long hours were needed to build the business, this led to some very stressful periods and in reflection only now can I fully understand just how much stress can damage creativity and the ability to deliver high quality goods, despite this I have consistently delivered high quality work, but with hindsight this could have been a lot easier.

Despite all the aforementioned, stress is often an important contributing factor in achievement, drive, ambition, learning and success. Managing stress and applying it in a timely and productive manner can be incredibly advantageous and help us work that little bit harder, and achieve more than competitors while still appearing as if work is somewhat easier, and that more is achieved on a daily basis.

At the time of writing, Net Visuals, is one multi-skilled individual offering professional web site solutions including hosting, design and media creation. Net Visuals has many equally important customers to collaborate with and work for and there are times when co-ordinating and supply demands can increase pressure and subsequent stress levels significantly.

For the benefit of maintaining a high level of personal health and in the interests of serving customers over the long term, managing stress and pressure is an invaluable skill to have and something which I apply in a proactive way, rather than a reactive way. This is why Net Visuals is able to juggle numerous tasks and skills successfully such as programming, support, consultancy and design, and continues to deliver professional and world class web solutions in shorter timescales made to order on a per customer basis.

Let's take for example Google. Google is regarded, particularly in the U.S based offices as having probably the best working environment of any modern business to reduce stress and pressure, with incredible exercise and leisure facilities helping employees to relax and keep fit and healthy. This kind of environment is fast catching on even in the UK, with some business even diversifying with leisure and having staff managed gardens. Employees are encouraged to become "green fingered", the benefits of fresh air, exercise, pressure free thinking and with "home grown" produce to eat as the end result(the down side of that however, is that employees only have the lunch hour to do it in, so unless you can use a shovel and eat a yogurt at the same time, there is likely to be a tough juggling act!)

With approximately 90% or more of Net Visuals business time spent at a desk, programming, communicating, planning, designing, accounting, completing VAT returns and numerous other business tasks this can have a particularly detrimental effect on creativity and concentration.. so how is Net Visuals able to continue to develop error-free high quality web solutions and provide such quality services for so many customers?

The main answer is that Net Visuals is a flexible business, changing working hours and goals proactively from week to week on an ongoing basis to meet the needs of customers. For instance, a customer may need to meet during the evening one week because it fits in with their work schedule, or some urgent work may need to be carried out for a customers computer during the weekend, this type of situation is becoming increasingly frequent. This level of flexibility is to be embraced and is all part of operating a customer focused business, particularly in the current economic climate. We are all going to have to do more during the recession and work longer hours, even though in a majority of cases we will be earning less despite the increase in hours and business commitment.. that's how it is and how it is going to be for some time. The overriding point to this is I do what I do because I love it, I enjoy it, it gives me a sense of satisfaction.. and above all I'm bloody good at it, I'm driven, passionate, and want the best I can give for my customers. Whether I was earning £10,000 p.a or £1,000,000 p.a. I would still be providing the same friendly customer focused, flexible high quality product and service. This is my niche.

So what's it all got to do with stress? The very fact that I have created this new blog, and that I have time for it is due to managing customer demand, stress and time and something that I would never have managed a number of years ago. I have many competing demands such as designing web sites for customers, creating customer tools, photography, email newsletters, creating new tourist web sites but the work is getting done. In fact just being aware of time and its constraints can help prevent stress. In the last two days alone I have designed three fantastic bespoke branded web site layouts for customers, this demonstrates to me that I am not stressed, and that creativity has been free flowing despite like every other business needing to meet quite pressured targets such as statutory VAT returns and annual accounting.

Part of this success is that I have split up my working time during the day and taken time to workout allowing myself a switch off period letting the brain "breathe", using a home gym and also cycling for 15km! Only two days ago it was 10km.. taking care of health, takes care of stress, takes care of productivity and creativity. And if you feel as though you do not have time for a walk, for exercise or for a coffee and some light reading then you most likely are stressed and should do exactly that!

Achieving more can happen, even if we think that its not possible by proactively managing stresses and anxieties caused by work and desire for achievement. Remember stress has an optimum operating level, and once you go beyond this peak you are running risks to your health and creativity.

A final note.. Net Visuals is creative, achieving, growing, succeeding and delivering flexible customer focused solutions day in day out meeting targets and removing excess stress all at the same time... healthy... professional... and looking after the future interests of our customers as they would expect.

If your web developer has not got time for you, not updating your web site efficiently and promptly, or your not getting the flexibility you desire from your supplier - hosting, domain name registration, design, photography - or any other service then Net Visuals should be your next telephone call, you can remove unnecessary stress too!

2009-04-27T20:12:00.002+01:00

Web 2.0 & Social Networking Technologies

I had made a conscious decision not to be a part of the social networking phenomenon, principally knowing that the oblivious supply of information on public social networking platforms on a personal level can provide businesses and other users with "power information" which, when delivered with a certain naievity could be detrimental in many ways.

For instance, as if to demonstrate my point, as I type this first blog post, on another browser tab, the Facebook profile management sidebar to the right displays a colourful and eye-catching advertisement for a t-shirt displaying my birth date which has been recently entered upon creating a Facebook account. If I was perhaps a little younger, had more disposable income, there would have been a sale right then, because actually it was something that I didnt own, and I would not see in a retail outlet within 50 miles.

The results of harnessing and processing even the smallest piece of information are apparent immediately and constitutes just one of the many ways in which embracing Web 2.0 and social networking can benefit business.

Realising then that Web 2.0 and Social Networking Technologies are incredibly important, particularly to small and particularly unrecognised businesses, Net Visuals is adopting a forward thinking strategy and hopes to be able to provide web customers with a consultation and advisory service to enable new and existing customers to adopt and embrace Web 2.0 and Social Networking Technologies and as part of a powerful set of business and information tools.

There are distinct differences in using Social Networking Technologies for personal and for business use, and the major difference should be quite obvious. Social Networking for business is really a duplication of what already exists but made available through various portals that allow your business to connect with new and exciting customers, suppliers and "fans". Most of the information that you may deliver through this avenue may be available in a brochure on your business premises, or on your own web site already. Social Networking for personal use is all about personal beliefs, interests, habits and lifestyle which would normally be available through conventional methods of communication to friends and family, and of course this information is likely to be selective in normal circumstances depending on who "needs to know".

It is important to recognise that Web 2.0 and Social Networking Technologies are not a replacement for other avenues of marketing and promotion either online or offline, and certainly will not necessarily reach all demographic customer groups to which your business or product is aimed.

For an exhaustive list of Social Networking Sites throughout the world you should visit Wikipedia and search for Social Networking or alternatively click this link to visit. The two most popular Social Networking Sites are Myspace with over 250 million users, and Facebook with over 200 million users but there are a myriad of other sites which may prove useful and appropriate for your business.

For a full definition of Web 2.0 you should also visit Wikipedia and search for Web 2.0 or alternatively click this link to visit the Web 2.0 page.