What networking events are there going on in Yorkshire, well..luckily for us Yorkshire business folk there are plenty of events and networking groups to attend.

Harrogate Networking Events

Harrogate has a few good networking groups, I’ve attended most of them now. It is up to you what cost and budget you’ve set a side for networking. As most of the organisations or groups will tell you regarding membership benefits that you will tend to build up trust and referrals once you start attending the groups or events more regularly.

Personally, you need to find out what works best for you. Try out a few different networking groups before you choose to commit to one.

Each group has different members and a different way of doing it. Find out what fits your business best.  I would also love to see MORE regular networking events starting up Harrogate without membership cost required.

Network North Harrogate

Frequency: Every Tuesday 7.30am

Place:
The Yorkshire Hotel
Prospect Place
Harrogate
HG1 1LA

Cost = £10.00 inc VAT.

You can attend twice before membership.

Organiser Contact Details
Alex Gordon
07949 402966

4Networking Harrogate Business Breakfast

Frequency: Two Wednesdays, each month. Next one is on Wednesday 11th of January.

Place:
The White Hart Hotel
Cold Bath Road
Harrogate
HG2 0NF

Cost = £10.00

Basic membership allows you to attend three events before deciding on membership.

Link to the group: http://www.4networking.biz/Events/Group/Harrogate

Harrogate Met Club

Frequency: Usually a Networking event once or twice a month. See www.themetclub.co.uk for details.

Place:
Hotel du Vin
Prospect Place
Harrogate
HG1 1LB

Cost = Varying costs for non members.

Organiser Contact Details
Lorraine
01423 525622

BforB Harrogate

Frequency: Every other Thursday morning

Place:
Grants Hotel
Swan Road
Harrogate
HG1 2SS

Cost = £10

Again you can attend 2-3 times as a non-member before deciding on membership.

Organiser Contact Details

Linda Stevenson
0796 663345

http://www.bforb.com

Harrogate Blah (Women Only)

Frequency: Regular meetings each month.

Cost = £20.00 per meeting

For the women of the business world in Yorkshire, there is also the Harrogate BLaH run by Rachel Auty & Ella Gascoigne.

Check website for more details of membership. http://www.harrogateblah.co.uk/

Leeds Networking Events

Leeds is probably the best place for networking in Yorkshire. There are plenty of events to attend all over the place. I’ve not listed every single event here but the mains one I’ve heard about or have been recommended have been listed.

LSxCafé

A monthly meetup for those working in the tech, media, startup, creative & digital arena, attracting designers, developers, entrepreneurs, researchers, investors, technologists and VCs.

http://lsx.co/lsxcafe/

Cost = Free

Frequency: Every First Tuesday of the month.

Place:
Old Broadcasting House
148 Woodhouse Lane
LS2 9EN Leeds
United Kingdom

The Magnet Club

When: Every First Tuesday of the month.

Place:
Shine Business Centre
Harehills Road
LS8 5HS Leeds
United Kingdom

Cost = £18.00

Wednesday 18^th

Check their Twitter for more.

Simply Networking

http://www.networking4business.com/leeds-events.htm

Frequency: Monthly events

Place:
Weetwood Hall
Otley Road
LS16 5PS, Leeds
United Kingdom

Cost = £10.00

Organised by Mark Greenwood

4Networking Leeds

Frequency: Multiple dates each month

Place:
Leeds City Centre
Crown Plaza Hotel
Wellington Street
Leeds
West Yorkshire

Cost = £10.00

Basic membership allows you to attend three events before deciding on membership.

Link to the group: http://www.4networking.biz/Events/Group/Leeds

Bettakultcha

Not quite business networking, but a great place to meet new people and contacts. Bettakultcha, is a night of presentations held in Leeds. A great place to improve your fear of public speaking!

http://bettakultcha.com/category/videos/leeds/

Co-organised by, Richard Michie and Ivor Tymchak.

York Networking Events

Techtogetha

A networking event specifically for technology specialists.

Frequency: Bi-Monthly event

Place:
The Catalyst
York Science Park
Innovation Way
Heslington
York
YO10 5DG

Cost = FREE

http://techtogetha.co.uk/

BforB York

Frequency: Fortnightly Fridays at 6.45am

Place:
The Bar Convent
Blossom Street
York
YO24 1AQ

Cost = £10

Again you can attend 2-3 times as a non-member before deciding on membership.

4Networking York & Pocklington

York also has a 4Networking  Group in York & Pocklington.

Other Larger Networking Organisations:

There is of course the BNI who have a various different groups active in Leeds, York & Harrogate. Leeds & North Yorkshire Chamber also run a number of networking events regularly and Harrogate has it’s own separate Chamber who also have regular networking events.

Finally, the Yorkshire Mafia also put on a number of networking events around the Yorkshire area.

I hope this helps you as it did me with your search for some great networking events and I hope you meet some new contacts and get obtain some new leads and prospects.

If you know of any other events that I’ve not listed here, why not add them in the comments below. Or you can drop me a line and I’ll add your event to the list.

For those who do read, share or comment regularly on my posts thank you very much indeed! I invite you to leave a comment below and tell me what kind of posts and information you’d like to hear discussed in 2012.

A big thank you to everyone who I have personally worked with or alongside over the last year and to my current set of clients have a fantastic Christmas break! Enjoy the time spent with your family and friends.

Special Christmas Thanks to the following People:

Chris Fairey, Digipest – For being one of the best mates a guy could have and a top developer to boot!

Joanna Butler, Search Engine Chocolate - For being a great friend when you need her most and for keeping me sane.

Simon Barker, Zath - For sharing his Google pain alongside me and for being a top notch bloke, blogger and friend.

Jackie Hole & Dan McGuire, Carnival Creative – For keeping my sane and for being good friends who I can rely on.

Stuart Bamforth, Digital Mercenary – For being a great designer, friend and introducing me to a great client this year.

Gavin Llewellyn, One to Many Mornings – For his great blog posts, feedback on my re-design and being a pretty cool person to talk too.

Julie Cheung, Carloan4u - For being a great SEO to know and for sharing her experiences and thoughts with me.

Dom Hodgson, Hodgetastic  – For putting on so many great SEO conferences, letting me speaking when no-one else would and for making me laugh when we meet up.

Tim Nash, Coding Futurers – For being a great person to talk too, helping me rally people for geek meet ups in York.

Paddy Moogan, Distilled – For interviewing me on his blog, being a great SEO to know and generally top dude.

Julie Bikerdyke (My bookkeeper) – For keeping my accounts from not being a mess and putting up with me.

Stuart Ramsay, Accountancy Extra – For all the great feedback and words of encouragement.

Karyn Fleeting & Joel Turner, Tinderbox Media - For being superb people to work with and good friends

Gary Hartley, FrogsThemes - For giving me honest (no bullshit) feedback and advice without pulling any punches.

Toby Drysdale, SEO Consultant – For all the great football banter and words of encouragement.

Also a very Happy Christmas to all of Smartdog digital’s,  partners, freelancers and the Awesome Games team. 

To all my other friends, contacts, followers on Twitter & Facebook, here’s to a wonderful Christmas and well deserved break for all of you and best wishes for 2012. Thank you for continued support.

Most of all thanks to my Dad for putting up with me, loving me as only a Father could and support me along this journey where ever it takes me.

Following on from Avinash Kaushik’s exceptional blog post Online Marketing Still A Faith Based Initiative where he talks about the following:

For all the data that is available online to businesses, we still rely mainly on faith based decisions. The problem he says, lies not with how we measure, the problem lies with you (company executives).

Avinash states three important reasons to answer why in a world so full of data, so empowering when it comes to relevance and creativity…why is it we suck so much at online measurement:

Based on his experience they are:

1. The web has been around forever and yet it is not in the blood of the executives who staff the top echelons of companies.
2. We still believe in and live in the world of “shout marketing”, the thing we have practiced on TV, radio and magazines all our lives.
3. Our lousy standards for accountability.

Why Aren’t you Measuring your Website Marketing Correctly?

What do I mean? Frankly, you as a company are quite happy to rely on assumptions and guesswork about your own website and online performance.

Customers are getting tortured every single day by ineffective websites, poor user interfaces and usability, and generally unappealing content.

You heard me! You measure your finance and billing, you track your company time using project management tools, you probably even note all your working hours in the office per employee.

WHY THEN… is your website the most neglected part of your business measurement strategy. Far too many companies in the UK alone are quite happy to throw money down the drain when it comes to their online marketing efforts, even in these tough economic times.

People assume that just because it’s a website and the fact it’s online means that it cannot be measured easily or it’s far too easy to ignore all the data that is collected.

The problem is not with the measurement tools or how we measure. The problem lies with you. There is a distinct lack of in-house knowledge and understanding about online marketing practices within some companies and how to measure online business intelligence effectively, especially in higher paid executive positions.

The UK internet economy is forecast to grow at 10% per annum between 2009 and 2015 to £174bn or possibly to as much as £228bn. - Boston Consulting Group, October 2010

Are you going to let your company miss out on available growth through online channels just because your happy to base decisions on faith and guesswork. I didn’t think so.

How Many Times Have you said any of these Statements:

• I think my pay per click spend of £1,000 a month is generating sales and leads
• I think my pay per click campaign generates ROI
• I think my search engine traffic is producing sales and enquiries
• I think the £10,000 we’ve just invested into SEO has resulted in more search traffic and authority
• I think my re-design of my website has resulted in more traffic and conversions
• I think my digital agency are doing a good job
• I think my visitors read our content
• I think our website has a good conversion rate
• I think my time on social media is well invested
• I think our customers find our website easy to use

Why should you be unsure of your answer?

Yet,  you are probably a person who has said at least one of these statements over the past year. In 2012, let’s put a stop to relying on assumptions and guesswork.

Most businesses have Google Analytics installed as standard, the main web analytics solution to track and measure your website performance. Stop ignoring it, don’t leave it your web designer or agency to interpret it for you, take control of your data and start discussing it within your company.

You will always need the support of a good web analyst to help you ask the right business questions of the data, such as ; ‘What is my best source of converting traffic?

But that doesn’t mean you can’t start discussing your website performance in your boardrooms and make it a focal part of your measurement strategy in your business already.

Start Measuring for Real

Hire a online marketing consultant to educate your marketing teams or hire someone in-house with the knowledge. Why are you prepared to listen to the guesswork and assumptions of others.

I’ve seen it with my own two eyes, companies who have ‘bought into’ what the marketing agency was selling, only to have no idea what they were paying for, how it should be measured or what results it generated.

It is criminal to think that this happens on a daily basis online! Shocking really, especially when we can measure our online channels with a 90%+ accuracy.

Yet, the education and knowledge gap grows wider every day, there are too few companies willing to educate and teach their clients about the results and how to measure their online marketing campaigns effectively.

What you Should try Measure and Improve in 2012:

• Setup basic goals tracking in Analytics to measure your website objectives e.g. conversions for; sales, leads, marketing material downloads.
• Try to increase your organic search traffic for 2012, look at your % share of search terms.
• Stop relying on ‘shout marketing’ metrics, visits, clicks, impressions, page views. They don’t mean much at face value.
• Segment different traffic performance individually to find what is best and what drives the best ROI.
• Focus on increasing your website conversion rate.
• Measure Visitor Loyalty & Visitor Recency. See who comes back and consumes your content regularly.
• For E-Commerce / Online Retail, measure and focus on increasing Average Order Value and decreasing your Days/ Time to Purchase.

Ask yourself this final question: Why does your website exist?

You should focus primarily on what your answer is.

This overall business objective will help you drive your website goals and key performance indicators in 2012. For example; my website exists to sell X product, then you might focus on improving your average order value, website conversion rate and organic search traffic to increase % of product X sales online and overall sales revenue of product X.

Make sense. I hope so.

Good luck and let’s try change 2012 to focus less on faith based decisions, instead focusing more on educated, results driven, data based facts.

Thank you for reading, if your business needs help educating your marketing teams to measure your online performance effectively or you want to hire a consultant to help you improve your website performance please give me a call on +44 (0)113 815 3328 or alternatively you can get in touch here.

We were approached by the Plan Shop Architects in Bedale to help them gain a new web presence that would reflect their status as a quality, local, architecture firm who specialise in Landscape and Interior Design, being an enthusiastic team of design professionals.

For a reasonable budget (nearly 70% cheaper than the average cost of a website), we helped introduce Plan Shop Architects to the benefits of using WordPress to build their new website. For smaller business we recommend buying a pre-designed professional WordPress Theme and then building upon it.

Though sometimes, you might not be able to find a professional theme that suits your business’s individual requirements. See my post on ‘The Quest for the Holy WordPress Theme‘

In this project we purchased a pre-designed professional premium theme on behalf of the client which Smartdog then did the following with:

• Professional WordPress Setup and Installation
• Customised the design to the clients liking and brand
• Populated the theme with the content and optimised it for search engine visibility.
• Installed recommend plugins for SEO and social media sharing

Novak has been a true inspiration to me over the last year since starting my own business. He had one dream to play and win Wimbledon and he did it!  If you stay focused on what you want to achieve and put in the effort and hard work, then anything is possible.

Here are my 10 business lessons that I’ve learnt from Novak Djokovic:

1. Know Yourself Better than your Competitors

It is better to focus on your own game than follow what your competitors are doing all the time. It can be really frustrating if you’ve had a bad or tough week and someone else who is competing directly with you has won a new client or has just landed that big contract win. So what? It doesn’t make a difference to you.

With the rise of social media such as Twitter, it is easy to get caught up in following your competitors or nearest rivals, trust me just don’t do it. It is not productive and you will end up making yourself feel worst. Focus on improving and knowing yourself better. It will prove a better use of your time in the long run, you might even learn something new about your own abilities or character.

Focus on yourself.

2. Refine and Improve your Techniques

Don’t stop when you think you have mastered something. Keep looking out for new techniques and always look to better yourself, the best footballers in the world like Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi don’t get good over night, they are always on the training ground practicing free kicks and learning to hit and control the football in new ways.

Novak is testament to this, he worked hard on his techniques and improve the areas that were weaknesses in his game. Even though he is now No.1 in the world, he is still trying to improve every day. You should too!

3. Keep Focused on Your Goals

Don’t stop until you get there, no one said it was going to be an easy ride. Along the way you will face much resistance (that little voice in your head), ignore the voices and cut out the noise, concentrate on your journey and don’t let the pit falls along the way prevent you reaching it.

Sometimes, it will take you longer to reach your objectives than you thought, but you’ll get there in the end as long as YOU believe you can. Forget about putting it off until tomorrow, take action now.

4. Have Fun Outside Work

Novak Djokovic has been know as the ‘Joker’ of the APT Tour, he is continually making fun of himself and that of others around him to lighten the mood. Yes, things can get far too serious at times especially when even the tinniest things can get blown way out of proportion.

Make sure you plan some downtime off the grid, it can help you refocus you attention on the things that really matter and help you take stock of what is important.

Have fun whilst you work, if you’re not doing something you love look at whether or not you’re doing the right thing at all. A positive mental attitude can have wonders on your productivity. Go smash it!

Keep yourself active, exercise and fitness are a great way to boost your energy levels and reduce stress. Medical fact!

5. You can crack a Competitive Niche

Nobody would of thought that anyone would of broken into the top 2 in the world and overthrow the complete Tennis dominance of Roger Feeder and Rafa Nadal. Most people in the media wouldn’t give anyone else a second look, people said that these two players would dominate the Men’s game for years to come but Djokovic managed to break in on their rein at the top.

Djokovic was able to do this because he believed in his abilities and didn’t listen to the critics or the Sports media that there wasn’t much hope for anyone else. He kept trying and working hard until he had an opportunity to beat his rivals.

This is pure determination to push forward even when it doesn’t seem realistically possible to achieve, just as the Adidas strap line says ‘Impossible is Nothing‘

6. Practice Makes Perfect

As a business owner, entrepreneur, or even as an employee you’re not going to get things right every time. No one is perfect, everyone is human. I’ve learnt as I have gone along, heck, this is the first time I’ve ever ran my own business, I am expected to know the right answer to every problem? Of course not.

Every single successful business person will tell you that they have made many big mistakes along the way, the crucial thing is to learn from you’re mistakes.

Each time you learn, you’ll get better and better at what you do. Keep refining your business processes and try to smooth out the areas that don’t work so well to make them more effective.

7. Adopt a Winning Mindset

How would Novak Djokovic have won anything if he only aimed to compete. He wanted to win, not just win once, he wants to win every match. You should approach your business with the same mindset. Try not just to compete each day, but turn up to win.

A strong winning mindset will help you accomplish more, even if it’s just winning at your day to day to do list, you will still achieve much more than just competing.

8. Keep Calm Under Pressure

Stress and pressure is part of life, it’s a fact. Pressure is a form of resistance (it’s that little voice or voices telling us but what happens if we fail or lose). You have to deal with it, put it out of your mind. Focus on what is in front of you.

Life is too short to worry all the time, believe me! You put pressure on yourself, manage your deadlines and workload more effectively to reduce pressure. Set yourself and your clients sensible deadlines that everyone can adhere to.

9. Support from Friends & Family is Important

Novak couldn’t have won all those Titles on his own, he had the strong support of a great coach, his family and his close friends. Business is never easy, it is especially important you keep tight-nit support lines around you.

Ask your friends, family and peers for advice. You’ll be amazed at how many people are in exactly the same position as you and  they can share many of the same experiences and advice with you. I know I’ve reached out to people who I respect greatly to get calm words of advice when I’ve needed them most.

Don’t forget who your friends are.

10. Stay Humble and True to Your Roots

Novak Djokovic has always been a humble champion, thanking his supporters, fans and competitors in his success. Novak Djokovic didn’t just win titles for himself, he did it for Serbia. Never has a nation been so proud of its sporting hero.

Even if you become mega successful, remember to stay humble for what you have achieved. Nobody likes a showoff, too many times I’ve seen bloggers and other business owners rise to stardom and they have complete forgotten about the people who put them there in the first place.

No one likes an ego, respond to the people who reach out to you. No matter how big you get.

Thank your customers, subscribes and fans for staying loyal to you and think about those humble beginnings.

Finally, thank you Novak Djokovic, you make me proud, you make all of Serbia proud! Most of all, you have taught me some pretty inspirational lessons that I’ve shared here on my blog for everyone to read! You are the best! You are my sporting hero!

Flickr Photo Credit: By Frédéric de Villamil

Flickr Photo Credit: By toga (John Togasaki)

Flickr Photo Credit: By y.caradec (Yann Caradec)

Ok so I have tell you honestly about this cheap link building tactic, I’m sure that many people in the industry will agree for my reasons in taking this viewpoint. These views are my own, agree or disagree, I wanted to make people aware that this is happening.

Post Update: To highlight the fact that it’s not just web design agencies who use this sneaky cheating link building tactic but also big reputable brands. I recommend strongly reading Joost De Valk’s revelations on GoDaddy’s spammy link building techniques.

Throughout this post, I’m strictly referring to website design agencies and digital agencies NOT freelance designers, developers or independent design studios. Also, it is worth noting that not every agency uses this technique, but unfortunately there are lots that do!

I have always taken the view that most links should be built organically by hard work, networking, social media, interacting with authority blogs and websites, article writing, guest posting and establishing a true brand reputation online.

SEO takes time, it’s a long term investment, not a quick fix. Your content should really speak for itself.

It is logical that you should work at establishing yourself as an authority on a particular area or topic, I can’t think of anything better as a blogger or company to raise your profile and reputation.

Here are some reason why I’m particularly against this technique that some web design and digital agencies employ to quickly and cheaply improve their own SEO authority and rankings in Google.

Offers No End Value to the Client

I’m venting my concerns with this technique as it has long been the practice of some website design and digital agencies to place a small link or in some case the logo of their company at the footer of the page to let visitors know who designed that particular website.

I have no problem with a logo e.g. designed by example or website by example.

What isn’t right, is putting a small text link, usually contains the anchor text of a particular keyword e.g website design agency e.g. Web Design Leeds or Digital Marketing Agency on there.

Also, because it is placed in the footer of the website, it is usually replicated site wide meaning it is counted more than once and on multiple pages

You might be surprised to find out that some website design and digital agencies cheat to win at building their authority quickly in Google. I’ve summarised arguments for and against this, I’m personally taking the latter view.

Piggy backing on Search Engine Authority

The client has spent their own money, time and effort over the years building up their authority in the search engines. Perhaps, an SEO agency did a fantastic job on their content, optimisation and link building recently and have helped propel the website’s authority higher and higher.

Why then, should a web design company or digital agency (who also might be selling SEO as a competitor) be allowed to place a link on the client’s authoritative website and piggy back off the hard work of the client’s or the SEO agency’s investment.

Reasons why you COULD argue doing this:

• They built the website, they should be credited for their hard work and for the long term maintenance of the website.
• A link is possibly worth more to them, than any referrals through word of mouth.
• People who like the website design will see the link and might click through to enquire

Really, that is the only three possible justifications that I could think off. Now, lets hear the reasons why not.

Reasons why you SHOULD NOT be doing this:

• The link offers no end value to the clients website or its visitors
• It’s not just one link on the homepage, it’s a link on the footer of every single page across the entire website.
• The client rightfully paid for the work, that should be thanks enough
• If your work is good enough, your client would spread referrals through word of mouth anyway.
• If you are so proud of your work, showcase it in your portfolio instead
• It is a completely free link for them. No effort required.
• They are using the clients own authority in Google to build their own reputation and authority

Here’s food for thought…

Google should be de-value Footer links worldwide on the basis that they offer no value to anyone but the people who exploit them unfairly.

Eric Ward, made some really good couple of points on Joost’s earlier blog post that I’ve included here:

• These links should not impact search rank.
• These links would be fine if they did not impact search rank.
• These links are positively impacting search rank for some, but not all, sites that try them.
• This encourages others to try it.
• Search Engine’s need to ignore all footer links for rankings purposes. Not some, not most. All.
• Nobody puts high importance content links at the very end of a web page, and then does it over and over on other pages. If all footer links were removed from rankings calculations, the results would be better and the collateral damage would be minimal.

If you are giving a website design or digital agency free reign to put a link on your website consider how much authority and page rank your website has in Google and think again before you give them the right to stick a link containing their keywords on your authoritative website that you have worked so hard to build.

If you agree or disagree I would love to hear you views in the comments below.

I am simply going to tell you that you shouldn’t hire someone who calls themselves a ‘Social Media Guru‘ or ‘Expert‘, other people should be calling you that for starters. Make up you’re own mind if you agree or not, frankly it is becoming a disease, a plague, there a far too many people ruining small businesses overall perceptions of social media.

Don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of other legitimate people out there who are truly helping educate people to understand the value of social media and also helping businesses to measure their involvement on this marketing channel more effectively.

Twitter and Social Media are Still YOUNG

Twitter celebrated their fifth anniversary in March of this year. Only two years ago, the mainstream (all those celebs, footballers and media types) didn’t even know what Twitter really was, now just look at where we are today!

Charlie Sheen signs up to Twitter and becomes the fastest followed celebrity in the history of Twitter, in just over 24 hours he accumulates over a million followers.

5 years…all summed up in beautiful celebration by the hilarious video by Funny or Die.

Compare to say Radio and TV, social media is a relatively new communication channel. It was only really 2 years ago that Twitter was properly accepted into the mainstream, I like to think that this date was christened fully when Oprah finally took to Twitter.

Now when you turn on your radio or watch the news, you’ll see presenters and reporters mentioning Twitter all the time, asking you to follow them to keep updated with the latest news and talk to them directly.

Twitter is still growing as a communication channel, people are still working out how to properly monetise it and how they can take it further. As a Marketing channel, it is rapidly changing and keeps growing from day to day, what’s new today can soon become old tomorrow.

There is a new measurement tool released pretty much every month to measure, track and report on social media more effectively.

Watch out there’s another Guru about!

So you’ve being tweeting for a while? You’ve been using Tweetdeck and Hootsuite for about 3 weeks now, you’ve accumulated a massive following on Twitter, so what? No one cares, it doesn’t make you a qualified ‘guru‘ or an ‘expert‘. I call these people ‘social media spoofer’s‘ or you might prefer the term ‘Social Media Douchebags‘

Telling signs that you’re dealing with a social media spoofer:

• They are always mentioning how high their Klout score is (Klout, is a measurement of authority on social media, but it’s pretty damn easy to game)
• In their Twitter profile they have the words ‘guru’, ‘expert’, ‘ninja’ or ‘coach’ mentioned.
• They are following 10,000 people and have 10,000 followers back (most likely auto-generated I might add!)
• They don’t have a presence on more than one social network, they just sick to one
• They are always posting loads of links on Twitter to blog posts about social media (but have never actually written one themselves)
• The words ‘Rockstar’ or ‘Wunderkind’ have been used to describe themselves frequently
• They will never respond to your Tweet, how could you ever see it if you’re following so many people back!
• They will probably have an ‘auto DM’ message that says ‘Thanks for following me back, check out my wicked social media 2.0 mega bucks program! Here…

You should also check out this List of Social Media Gurus on Twitter: a Public Service for CMOs.

If you do actually want to hire someone to help you with your social media marketing judge them on their knowledge, experience and what content they put out on Twitter themselves, read their blog posts and look at how well they engage with their own audience. That’s a telling sign that you’re dealing with someone who actually knows their stuff.

If they never mention the words ‘measure’ or ‘analyse’ once in conversations with you, run a country mile because all online marketing can be measured. Social media doesn’t always have a monetary ROI, but you can measure its impact with a variety of professional tools to see if your efforts are making a difference to your business objectives.

I hope you hire the right people that know their stuff. Remember, an ‘expert’, ‘ninja’, ‘guru’ or ‘rockstar’ is not a descriptive word you should use to describe yourself, if someone else likes to refer to you as one, then that’s fine!

I’m going to be blogging another post in the next couple of days about Twitter so stay tuned!

Twitter Sand Pic Photo Credit By Rosaura Ochoa

Avinash Kaushik, the true modern godfather of Web Analytics defines the process as:

Web analytics can both simple and complicated. At its very base level, it is essentially the process of collecting data about the activity of website visitors who come to your website and by using that data to give you usable and relevant results that you can use to guide your business decisions online and ultimately improve your website performance.

However, this simplicity belies the immense influence that a well-implemented web analytics program can have on your visitors, sales and overall online success.

Yet so many business today fail to even recognise the importance of Web Analytics as part of their overall business strategy, crazy in this digital age!

Online stores and websites pose particular challenges to businesses. People do not physically walk into your online store and browse the shelves, it can be difficult for you to understand what is working, what could be improved, and what you need to do to put your best foot forward.

Analytics can change that.

Making Informed Decisions Online

Many businesses are paying for data to be collected about their online customers, but rather than using that data to set goals and make inform business decisions, they are happy to rely on the suggestions of SEO consultants and website managers. – or worse, they just use guesses and assumptions, with no way to evaluate the results of their initiatives.

It is, of course, natural to take the advice of experts (I should know), but as the key decision-maker you should always demand that you are given full information about why something has been suggested and an independent measure by which to evaluate its success or failure.

Web Analytics Rocks!

So, what exactly is it that Web Analytics can do? It is possible for you to gather vast amounts of data on the activity of visitors who come to your site. You can record where they came from, which pages are most popular, how much time people spend on your website, how many unique visitors you have had and hundreds of other metrics.

However, as in other areas of business, raw data can only be so useful. Web analytics allows you to convert that data into conclusions and actionable insights. You can chart your progress over time and better understand the effects of new initiatives online.

For example, perhaps you have a high number of visitors, but few of those visits are converting into sales. Web analytics allow you to see which sources of traffic are most likely to provide visitors who make a purchase.

You can then implement a strategy that is designed to boost your visitor numbers from these sources. Future web analytics reports will show you if your strategy is working to attract these visitors, and if these visitors are continuing to make purchases at the same rate as before.

Perhaps your SEO manager has suggested an ambitious new strategy that requires an overhaul of your website content and, of course, a substantial fee for themselves. Rather than making your decision in the absence of any information apart from their say-so you can use Web Analytics to guide your decision.

You could make the changes on a small part of your website, compare the Web Analytics for that area before and after the change and then make your decision based on hard data (and most importantly facts!).

Don’t Miss Opportunities to Improve

Web based businesses are not alone in missing the opportunities for market insight that data such as this can provide, but the fact is that Web Analytics make it easy to understand the background of your customers and their decisions. How often does the owner of a brick and mortar store owner have the opportunity to know exactly why a customer decided to enter their shop? Many of them would kill to have such avenues for customer research, and yet so many online business owners fail to take advantage of this opportunity.

Online business is not so different to traditional brick and mortar stores – the medium and method have changed, but your ultimate goal is still the same – to grow your business and make a profit.

Actionable Insights and Intelligence

It can be tempting to assume that all you need to do is hire a website manager or SEO expert (I use the term expert lightly) and let them handle the technical details, but without Website Analytics powering your decisions you have no way to measure their performance other than by their own assessments.

You would never accept this from another employee, so why is it something you consider with your online strategy?You do not have to be a technical whizz to interpret web analytics reports. You simply need to set measurable goals, monitor your progress, and evaluate the impact of various strategies, just as you do in other areas of business. The more you learn about Web Analytics, the more opportunities for growth and innovation you will discover.

Hopefully this post has given you a greater understanding of the essential part that web analytics has to play in helping you to monitor your success and inform the marketing decisions that drive your business forward.

I’ll be continuing to blog about Web Analytics, Online Marketing, and improving your Online Business, so if you want to stay up to date with these tips and advice, sign up to my newsletter on the blog. If you need a good analyst to report on your website data then give me a call.

I’ve personally been shortlisted for the Digitally Leeds Awards, which is part of the series of Leeds Digital Festival events. The awards are being put on by Dom Hodgson of Hodgetastic. Some of you will recognise Dom’s name before as the organiser and founder of Think Visibility, the very best SEO conference in the whole of the North.

I entered the award for ‘Freelancer of the Year’ which I (Illiya Vjestica) representing Smartdog digital have been shortlisted for. I’m very pleased to have made the shortlist, it’s first time I’ve been personally shortlisted for an award under Smartdog.

We’ll be attending on the 30th of November, the event is taking place at the familiar setting of the Alea Casino, a home away from home for many of us Leeds Digital people who also attend Think Visibility on a regular basis.

I’m really excited to meet the other freelancers and candidates who have been shortlisted for the awards as well. Fingers crossed I might have a chance of winning.

I believe the event is still taking requests for sponsors for the event. I see it as a very good opportunity for local Leeds based businesses to get their name across to up and coming startups, entrepreneurs and some very well know people on the Leeds Digital circuit.

Leeds Tweeter Award

I’m also really looking forward to see who wins this award. This award is for Leeds based user with the most impact on twitter.

I’m personally routing for Darren who runs local Leeds blog My Life in Leeds, which is a brilliant resource for getting to understand the Leeds City culture, find places to see, things to do and where to go to experience the best the City has to offer.

I haven’t had the pleasure of meeting Darren personally, though we have some mutual friends and I’m looking forward to meeting him at the event and asking him about his website.

See you all there!

Every single website no matter how good needs to continually be improved upon, tested and then refined. Even an online marketers website!

Why the New Theme Then?

It is cheaper and more cost effective for businesses to buy a premium designed WordPress theme and customise it, rather than to develop one bespoke from scratch.

If you haven’t yet heard of WordPress, it is web software that you can use to create a beautiful website or blog. WordPress is open source software that is completely free to use, there are literally thousands of plugins and themes available to transform your website into almost anything you desire.

With my old website the designer did a very good job on the homepage design, but I felt the developers who coded the finished design into the final WordPress theme made a complete mess of the content pages and the blog styling. I was never 100% happy with it, in the end it was also proving a pain to update!

If you don’t like the look of your content or the design of your blog and it’s a pain to update, you’ll end up never updating your website because of it.

Start the Quest…

I’m going to recall a short story to you of one man’s quest to find the perfect WordPress theme for his business….THERE IS NO PERFECT WORDPRESS THEME.

You heard me, there isn’t a perfect WordPress theme out there that is going to tick every box and do everything you want it do. Trust me! Unless you are happy to spend a couple of thousand pounds with a designer and developer to custom build you something, it is difficult to make a premium WordPress theme do everything you want it to.

Some themes include various typography options, custom post types for different page styles, shortcodes for buttons, forms, lists, testimonials etc.

Each theme designer has his own way of designing a theme, we’re all unique individuals. You will find that one theme has the perfect design of a services page, yet it’s overall design is not what your looking for. Maybe the theme you want has shortcodes for buttons, but not a testionmals shortcode.

There must be a compromise when choosing a theme.

Admittedly, those who know me personally would say I’m a bit of perfectionist when it comes to design. With this project I went through about 9 different premium WordPress themes (which I had to paid for!) before I ended up with this current theme.

It’s been a long hard road but I’m happy with the end theme as it’s got enough of the features and functionality I require.

Choosing a WordPress Theme

Believe me, these short bullet points will save you a lot of wasted time and money.

• Test drive the theme demo beforehand. Test the various customisation options, layout and functionality first.
• Look for a theme that includes as many layout options and extra elements such as buttons, testionmals etc. that you require.
• Pick a theme by a reputable theme designer
• Check the comments and feedback for a theme before purchasing
• Visualise your content in the theme, does it look right
• Choose a theme that looks easy to update and setup
• Run your choice by a few trusted contacts or friends before choosing
• Get a designers opinion on the theme

WordPress is the world’s greatest content management system and will be for a long time, sometimes it is easy to find the right theme for a project, other times you are going to be faced with some difficult choices, you need to find a compromise with the theme choice.

This will prevent you from choosing too many themes and be endlessly looking for a new perfect holy grail WordPress theme, as I said before it does not exist.

Failing that if you can’t find a WordPress theme to fit your business or project requirements, I know a great freelance Yorkshire Web Designer who can help you make the most of WordPress without crippling your bank account.

Flick Photo Credit: By Eddi van W.