clickcreations

New Years 2012

bwaymark — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 15:27:41 +0000

A big happy new year to all our friends and customers! At clickcreations we reckon that this year is the year of the Mobile Smart Phone. The diminishing price point of iPhones and other smart phones and the huge growth of tablets and other such devices has now fundamentally shifted the way in which people are using the internet. Having a website that is accessible on small-screen devices is becoming as important as it is on traditional desktop and laptops. As a special offer, we are giving a free mobile-ready analysis to anyone who is keen to ensure the mobile readiness of their website. This involves viewing the site on various small screen devices such as tablets, iPhones, and Android phones and getting a report back on how well it fairs and what can be done to make it better. Normally this would cost £50.

An exciting thing to look for this year and the next coming years is the fundamental shift that is happening in retail shopping. Amazon, eBay, and e-commerce in general have already changed they way people are shopping but so far these innovations have generally just added sophistication to the already existing ‘catalogue’ module. This is all changing now.

In South Korea, for example, a trial was done where a supermarket created a large screen in a subway station and projected an image of their isles. Commuters were then able to use their mobile phones to scan in the product codes to chose their shopping while they waited for their train. Once they had done their shopping, the order was sent to their local supermarket and delivery was arranged. The trial was a huge success with the supermarket’s online sale increasing by over 135%. SeeDesign Boom. This is just the beginning of a new era our retail shopping! Private shopping pods, an increase in personal shoppers (both online and offline) and consolidation of goods and services are all being predicted for the future as retailers try to take the chore out of shopping and lure people away from current online providers.

One of the key strengths of eBay and Amazon is the ‘customer rating’ system. This success has created a new era of customer rating and customer advocacy with websites like Trip Advisor and Best Of offering businesses a way of reassuring their customers before making purchases while giving consumer an opportunity to promote products or services based on their experience. A whole new profession of online-reputation managers and consultants has already begun to emerge!

It is an exciting year ahead! Our move away from our in-house content management system in favour of WordPress has been a major success. We have been able to offer better websites, with more features, at a reduced cost. WordPress’ innate SEO capabilities have helped all our WordPress customers move up in their google rankings, and the extendability has allowed us to do things like create an automated Google Merchant Feed plugin so our e-commerce customers can automatically submit their product list to Google Merchant Services.

Look out in the coming year for increased focus on making websites mobile-ready, new features and new search engine optimisation techniques, and very special Project X about which you will be hearing more soon!

Thanking you all for you custom and a very happy new year!

Setting Up A Website

bwaymark — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 12:59:42 +0000

Setting up a website can feel like a daunting task, how do you know whats involved? Have you made sure all the bases are covered? What is the best platform to use? The questions are endless!

Here is a small list of things you should be considering for your new site:

Domain names

Domain names are the address you type into a browser to find a website on the internet – ie www.clickcreations.com

They can end in .com .co.uk .net .org – a good choice for a UK based website is .co.uk

Try to pick a domain name that describes your services concisely, perhaps include your business name in the web address. If you use descriptive words for your web address then there is more chance of your site getting ranked for good search terms relating to your business.

Web Design

The design of your site is very important, it is your 24 hour shop window to potential clients, so setting up an attractive and easy to navigate site is crucial. When you first set up a website it is helpful to look at what your competitors are doing and make notes of the things you like about their website.

Structure your content so that it is easy to find, if people have to try to hard to find the information they want they will get bored and leave your site.

Have bold calls to action on your website to encourage people to get in contact with you. Have lots of contact forms and incentives to help people feel confident they want to get in touch.

Content Management Systems

A content management system the software platform websites can be written in to allow the owner to edit and add content to their website. Not all websites are built with content management systems so its worth asking if the package you are thinking of buying comes with one.

There are a lot of content management systems on the internet, our preference is WordPress because it is easy to use, and performs exceptionally well on search engines. The scope for more complicated designs and functionality is easy to implement with WordPress as well.

Hosting

In order to have a website live on the internet, it needs to sit on a computer called a server, that is always switched on. Hosting packages are the space you rent on these servers so that your website is accessible to people searching on the internet.

There are a lot of options when it comes to hosting. The one thing I would say to look out for would be that your hosting package is compatible with the programming language you choose to build your website in.

All of our website packages come with hosting and support.

SEO

Its all fine and dandy to have a great looking site but if no one can find it on search engines then you aren’t going to get as much business from it as you could be.

SEO stands for search engine optimisation, in order for your site to appear in relevant searches on the internet google has to know that it is worthy of doing so. Google only wants to return good results so that people use their search engine. After setting up a website it is well worth investing some money in optimising your website to perform well in relevant searches.

Conclusion

The list above is in no way conclusive but it gives you a good starting point to work from when setting up a new website.

We try to make the process of setting up a website simple and easy. We give you all the tools you need to get a great looking, high ranking website for your business. If you are thinking of setting up a website give us a call to see how easy it can be! 01805 603 326

Google+ The New Social Media Network

bwaymark — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 12:57:27 +0000

Google are launching a rival social media network to facebook, it looks really good from what I’ve seen so far.

There are a lot of new terms to understand such as Huddles, Circles, Sparks and Hangouts. Here’s what they all do:

Circles
The easiest way to share some things with college buddies, others with your parents and almost nothing with your boss.

Hangouts
Let friends know that you’re free for a video hangout, any time, anywhere. Then catch up, watch YouTube or… just hangout.

Sparks
A feed of only the things that you’re really into, so when you’re free, there’s always something waiting to be watched, read or shared.

Huddle
Huddle is a new way for you to easily stay in touch while you’re on the go. With Huddle, you can text groups of people or individual friends in Google+ Mobile. When you receive a new message in Huddle, Google+ sends a push notification to your phone.

At the moment it is still in beta phase and you can’t get an invite to join for love nor money! However I don’t think it will be too long before the doors are cast open and the world is invited in to play.

For the moment though, here is a video to give you an idea of what its all going to be about!

Google +

I get the distinct feeling, facebook will be sleeping uneasy for a while until they see the impact that google plus is going to have on their business …

Google +1 New Search Feature

bwaymark — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 12:55:51 +0000

This month sees the global launch of the new google +1 social media button feature on google.

What is google +1?

Its a little button with +1 written on it which comes up when you’re logged into google, people can click on search results, or on a button on your website if you’ve got one installed. This then tells google that you are worthy of social attention! Or at least a thumbs up.

Google says:

The +1 button is shorthand for “this is pretty cool” or “you should check this out.”

Click +1 to publicly give something your stamp of approval. Your +1′s can help friends, contacts, and others on the web find the best stuff when they search.

Social media activity is becoming more and more important in SEO these days, google are letting people vote with their feet, so its a great idea to get one of these buttons on your site sooner rather than later. If you need a hand adding one onto your site get in touch!

More information on google +1 can be found here http://www.google.com/+1/button/