If you are immersed in the world of internet marketing, you have probably heard many times the advice: don’t re-invent the wheel, follow someone successful. But simply copying a business idea is sloppy and might not get you the results you are dreaming about, just because it has been done already in that way. So how can you add a zesty twist to your business idea?Many people use the excellent technique of brainstorming. You simply write down, without editing, all the business ideas you can think of. Remember, you shouldn’t judge any idea at this point.The best place to start, of course, is to think of business ideas relating to your interests and passions, things you know quite a lot about or are passionate about learning more about. Anything can work: pet care, model airplanes, car accessories, home decorating, knitting…But identifying your passions and interests is only the very first step toward a great business idea. Let’s face it, many people have cats, for example and learn about the best food for their cat or all about the best product for eliminating tics. So how can you come up with original business ideas on such a popular topic?For your first business idea, try to stick with things you have experienced. Do you have a special tip to share with people? Something you learned while trying something new? Is there a life experience you can describe in detail and through it help others who are going through the same experience as well?The point is that you will always have an original twist to your basic business idea, because no one has gone through any experience in the exact way you did, with the same emotions and lessons, conclusions and thoughts…You will always have something different and unique to say about something common, some small change to offer to an already existing system, a personal perspective on things that gives you something to offer. There lies your personal bank of business ideas.A first original business idea can help you establish yourself as a brand name in the field of your interest. But what about other topics? What about your next business ideas?Continue to brainstorm, using associations and questions. Associations can help you identify smaller markets, different ideas for complementing products, such as a series of books or a suite of programs, create related websites and much more beyond that. The sky is the limit, plain and simple!The questions you can ask yourself about a business idea are, for example: does such a product already exist? Can I improve on the same idea? Is there a concern of people who share my interests that has not been taken care of yet? Can I come up with a simple solution to a simple problem?Remember, someone may have come up with a business idea you are interested in already, but you can always look for a personal twist of your own to add and make it uniquely yours.Brainstorming is the key to that mind vault of business ideas each one of us has. You can brainstorm everywhere, by your desk or in a restaurant. All you need is a piece of paper or an open file. Most people would prefer peace and quiet for this exercise.You can write single words or complete sentences, draw pictures that relate to your business ideas or any other technique that will keep the idea clear later when you review it. Let your brain run, don’t hold back.When you are done, you will be surprised at how many new and unique business ideas you can collect from this list. Simply add your personal twist and you are on your way to fulfilling your dreams.

Many business owners will here hear the phrase ‘search engine optimisation’ (or SEO) from friends in the business community or even competitors and may consider it as a route to increasing sales, but what is SEO? Alternatively, a business owner may have tried ‘SEO services’ in the past and found it either didn’t work as well as expected or was working, but no longer as effective – this article explains what SEO is, and why ‘new’ SEO is working better than ever.I have been working in search engine optimisation and ranking website market, before it was even called SEO. Here are the changes in SEO since the start of the new millennium and what you should be looking for in the SEO services that your SEO Agency offers or provides.We take a look back at SEO through the years and explain what SEO is today and how best to utilise it for our website.SEO in 2000Back at the start of the Millennium the ‘big’ search engines that most people were using were Lycos and Excite. Of course, back then a very small percentage of the UK population had access to the internet and those that did had a slow ‘dial-up’ system.Websites were one or two pages with basic information to allow them to load quickly (within 20 seconds). SEO practices back then were to ‘hide’ as many keywords on a page as possible, so the website was found for those searches without making the page look to spammy for visitors.In 2002 Google launched something called ‘AdWords’ and it was predicted to be the death of SEO, as people could pay for prominence, on the now the number 1 website for starting internet searches.In 2003, Yahoo purchased Inktomi, AltaVista and FAST, which was basically the end of all of the ‘smaller’ search engines. Google started to stamp down on ‘spam’ practices and websites. At the same time Google realised that ‘AdWords’ were not going to kill off SEO and that in fact the ‘natural listings’ encouraged visitors back to their search engine platform. Google started to recognise ‘professional SEO’ experts and promoted good SEO rather than spamming SEO.2004 saw the first website ‘banned’ from the internet as Google took action against websites that were spamming them. They also took legal action against the “SEO Company” responsible.To rank a website in 2006 you just needed links back to your website and so buying links / link exchange was all the rage and most websites had a web page where they would list companies and links to their website (I am still amazed how many websites continue this practice).Between 2004 and 2008 Google, now was the only real “player” in the search engine world, started taking action against poor linking practices and companies and started tightening up on spam and buying links. The ‘Noughties” ended with all “naughty” SEO practices being practically stamped out, as Google concentrated on ranking websites based on their content and it’s relevance to the search being carried out.SEO in 2010Between 2010 and 2015 we started to see the search engines take notice of ‘Social Media’ sites and soon the results were filled with Twitter ‘tweets’ in the results. (I can still see the face of one of my customers when searching Google for his business, and the whole first page of the search results were compiled of tweets of a Twitter conversation that two members of staff had been having about how terrible the company was!)Videos and images were also brought in to the search results with the Google ‘Caffeine’ update.Google introduced “personal search results” with the websites shown in the search results based on your previous searches and websites you had visited before. This caused a ‘bit of a stir’ in the SEO world as customers claimed their websites were “top of Google” for any search they did related to their industry, just because they had visited their own website many times before, so Google of course fed them back the website for all relevant searches. This can still be a bit of an issue until you show them the new ‘Google Incognito search’.The focus on ranking websites was on being found for BIG keywords. A ‘Plumber’ in Bristol would want to rank for that search, and so that was the focus.Google ‘Panda’ and ‘Penguin’ updates figuratively killed off ‘link exchanges’ with huge penalties for websites who had irrelevant links pointing towards them. At the same time Google introduced “no follow links” to allow websites to provide relevant links to other websites and information without penalising either party. It was the start of “safe linking”. Quality and relevant content was now the key to ranking in the search engines.A report by the ‘Office For National Statistics’ in 2014 stated:

38 million adults (76%) in Great Britain accessed the Internet every day, 21 million more than in 2006, when directly comparable records began.

Access to the Internet using a mobile phone more than doubled between 2010 and 2014, from 24% to 58%.

74% of all adults bought goods or services online, up from 53% in 2008. Clothes (49%) were the most popular online purchase in 2014.

Of all adults in Great Britain, 67% are aware of Internet storage space services, but the take up of these services to store data is much lower at 35%.

In Great Britain, 22 million households (84%) had Internet access in 2014, up from 57% in 2006.

Fixed broadband Internet connections were used by 91% of households.
The UK was now (almost) internet savvy and usage of mobile phones to visit websites was huge.SEO 2015 and OnwardsThe biggest change to the search engines in 2015 was the ‘penalisation’ of websites that were not “mobile friendly” – a mobile friendly website has different information for the smaller screen to make it easier for the user to read and understand. In ensuring that users got the best experience Google started ranking mobile friendly or responsive websites (where the website automatically changes its size and format to fit the screen) higher in the rankings.The UK population were using their mobile phones for local searches, and local companies could at last gain an advantage over the large corporates or ‘national’ companies on the internet.The introduction of ‘semantic search’, where Google brings back websites in the results not based on the keywords, but the content on a page, again changed the way SEO agencies looked at working on websites. Ranking for the ‘Big’ keywords, such as ‘Plumber Bristol’ became less important, as internet users became more savvy with their searches. ‘Long tail keywords’, and as many as possible, started to grow website visitors and more importantly, conversions.What is The SEO Process Today?It is probably correct to say that the processes or practices associated with search engine optimisation have now out grown the term ‘SEO’In years gone by working the content and structure of a website was enough. Now, there is so much more to do to not only rank a website in search engines, but to get customer engagement. A better description of the service would be ‘digital marketing’.Old practices, as mentioned earlier, meant ‘big’ keywords were key to ranking. A focus on a single keyword per page or even for a whole website would rank the business and back then it was all about ‘rankings’.Old way of doing SEOToday there are a number of factors to consider in regards to SEO. ‘Semantic search’ is the main driver and conversion the main goal, not rankings.Semantic search is where Google returns information on the page, not the description the website creator input, back to the searcher. An example of this would be to take the ‘Plumber Bristol’ example. A few years ago you would have concentrated on ranking the business for “Plumber Bristol”, “Plumber in Bristol” and perhaps “Emergency Plumber Bristol” – although this still holds true for businesses that offer a solution for ‘distress purchases’ (where time and a solution outweigh the need for information and advice) better practice throughout a website is to add content that offers advice and guidance and includes ‘long tail keywords’ (3 or 4 word searches) such as “Emergency plumber with free callout in Bristol” or “Reviews for an Emergency Plumber near me”. Google wants the user to have the best experience and find the relevant information quickly, and semantic search achieves this. This is also sensible for a business owner. Would you rather your website was found by a searcher looking for “Plumber Bristol” where they could be after information, looking to get a job, looking for a plumbing service that you may not offer, or for a specific and targeted search such as “best emergency Plumber near BS7″? “Plumber Bristol” will get you a website visitor, being found for “best emergency Plumber near BS7″ will get you a customer.In terms of keywords this is the largest change Google have made and it is here to stay. SEO or digital marketing is no longer about where you rank, but how many different search terms you can be found for and their conversion in to paying customers.Website ContentA few years ago (and only 2 or 3 years ago) Google suggested to professional SEO Agencies that 300 words on a page was sufficient content. Last year they stated the MINIMUM should be at least 500 words.Every day I am asked to review a website by a potential customer – and most of them have between 150 to 250 words on a page. This is common practice. There are two ways to look at this. Either Google has to change it’s expectations as most websites do not meet their grade or another way to look at this is as an easy way to jump the competition by simply adding content to your website. Do you think Google will lower it’s expectations or expect websites to improve to their standard? Google released the ‘mobile friendly’ update knowing that somewhere around 80% of websites would need to be upgraded – and they did it anyway as it benefitted over 50% of there users. Quality content effects 100% of their users.I recommend to our customer about 800 words per page. This is enough content to be ‘semantic search’ friendly, provide relevant content and not be too word heavy.Good practice is to have:

Page Title – say what the page is about (‘Big’ Keyword if you must)

Headline – asking a question

First paragraph explains briefly explains the content / solution

Image / or video

Longer description of the solution
Take our Emergency Plumber in Bristol, as an example:

Page Title: Emergency Plumber Bristol

Headline: Are you looking for the best emergency plumber near you in Bristol?

First Paragraph: Smith Plumbing offer a 24 hour emergency plumbing service in Bristol. We do not charge a call out fee and can be with you in 20 minutes. That is why our customer reviews and feedback say we are the best emergency plumbing service in your area. Call now on…

Image of the van or the Plumber looking professional

Longer description: What they can fix, common problems they resolve, some of the quotes from their customers etc.
This has a number of benefits.Firstly, those people who just want a Plumber will read the first paragraph, see the image of the van (build authority and professionalism) and call the Plumber. Other people will want more information which they can find further down the page. Is this cheating at SEO? Absolutely NOT. You are providing relevant information to the user and Google will love you for it. How content is structured and written on a page is the “new” SEO.The second benefit is that your website will start to be found for a combination of the words on the page – semantic search – in the example above the Plumber could be found by customers and potential customers looking for “Smith Plumbing”,”emergency Plumber near me”, “Emergency Plumber in Bristol”, “Best24 hour emergency plumbing service in Bristol”, “emergency plumber Bristol reviews” and dozens more search terms. If you were a Plumber would you rather be found for one big keyword or multiple relevant customer converting keywords? I thought so, and so does Google.Old practices were to create website content for the search engines. Now you must create content to provide value for customers. This is an easier process than you might think.What were the last 5 customer enquiries to your business? What was the problem they were trying to resolve? Write about the problem and your solution.Link BuildingThe historic way of ‘link building’ was to get as many links from as many places as possible. This year we has a very large company contact us about their SEO and they were horrified when we suggested that they needed to remove their 1.4 MILLION links back to their website as they had spent a fortune over the years buying the links. Irrelevant links, and the more you have the more detrimental it is, highlights to Google the irrelevance of your website – regardless of how relevant it might be.Today, a few, relevant links is far better than a Million links back to your website. Today, links have to be built through engaging relationships. Taking our Plumber once more, a link back from the ‘Gas Safe register’, a local plumbing centre or bathroom showroom, and a few local websites that like his information would be enough.Social MediaEven though we still get a some companies like this now, a few years ago when we suggested businesses should be on Facebook I was normally told “Facebook – that is for teenagers isn’t it? That is not our market”. If done well, Facebook can drive more traffic and paying customers to your door than your website. Facebook’s largest user group is 25 to 34 year olds, second largest is the 35 to 44 years old age group. The 45 to 54 year olds are using Facebook more than teenagers, and as nearly as much as 18 to 24 year old.Facebook Users UK age – courtesy of statistaFacebook allows a business to build a brand, engage customers, get customer reviews and instant customer feedback. Unlike reviews on your website which potential customer may see if they visit your website, a review on Facebook is seen immediately by all of the users friends and if their friend ‘likes’ the comment – all of their friends, friends. More and more of our customers are getting leads from Facebook. People are asking their friends for suggestions on businesses to use and getting dozens of suggestions back – if you are on Facebook you are more likely to get a direct link to your contact information.What is next for ‘Social Media’? Live streaming! Twitter has purchased a company called ‘Periscope’ which allows you to live stream video from your phone. “So what?” I hear our ‘emergency plumber’ asking. If I were a Plumber I would be live streaming my work as I fix a problem, with the video going out live to all of my followers and their friends – my own television channel that is free-to-air across the whole world. Next time your business conducts a ‘brain storming session’ – periscope it – your customer will tell you what the solutions are.Video MarketingThere are no ‘old’ SEO practices for video as it just didn’t exist and when YouTube started out it was for showing funny videos of cats and the like.Today that has all changed. YouTube is the second largest search engine in the world and is owned by Google. YouTube has over 1 BILLION users worldwide and every minute, 300 hours of videos are uploaded. It would take you about 2 years to watch all of the videos that will be uploaded in the next hour. It would take you the rest of your life to watch all the videos uploaded today. Google’s own statistics say that by 2018 73% of searches put into a search engine will result in the person watching a video. Think of it another way, in a couple of years when 10 people search the internet for your product or service – 7 of them will watch a video, 2 will visit a website. That is why I create videos for our customers as part of our ‘digital marketing service’.

8 Benefits of Engaging SEO Agencies to Boost Your Online Presence!Advertising has transformed to one of the most demanding and crucial aspects of having to run a business. This ultimately means that the overall success of your business is going to depend mainly on the effectiveness of your advertising campaign.Nowadays, online is where everyone’s at, which is also the reason why most businesses look to promote their products or services online. To do that, one needs to have a business website which will run their internet marketing campaign. With an abundance of spam links and countless other websites floating around in cyberspace, it’s easy for a business website to get lost or rank so low in the SERPs, that the chances of searchers to find the website are seriously diminished.Since, paying a search engine to place your business website at the top of its list doesn’t come cheap, the next best thing one can do is to use search engine optimization or SEO techniques to increase the clicks to the website and help it work its way up the search engine’s results page.Why You Should Hire a SEO Agency?Optimizing a website for a search engine can be not only a tough, but also costly process, mainly because there is just too many business websites competing for the coveted number one spot on the page rank, by using the exact same keywords.While businesses can opt to do their own SEO, hiring a SEO agency that has experienced search engine optimizers will no doubt, help businesses reap ROI in the long run. One of the best ways in which businesses can do that is by outsourcing their SEO needs to qualified SEO agencies.The growing demand for SEO services has lead to a mushrooming of many a great number of SEO agencies fulfilling their business objective, which has lead many businesses seeking SEO services asking the question, “how do we find the best SEO service provider?”Obviously, all those searching for SEO agencies will have to make their selection by passing SEO companies through careful and meticulous scrutiny, in order for them to get the best in search engine optimization for their business website.Benefits of Using SEOOne of the most obvious advantages of using the services of SEO agencies is their ability to enhance the visibility of a business website, but that being said, business owners also raise concerns on affordability, which can only be analyzed when businesses know the benefits of using the services of SEO agencies. In more ways than one, the following are some of the benefits of using search engine optimization services, especially the right ones, which can allow businesses to enjoy the following advantages.Target TrafficWhile businesses embark on an SEO marketing campaign, they should realize that an entire marketing campaign can fall flat on its face if a business is unable to reach the masses, that is, their target audience. It doesn’t really matter whether your business website is attracting hundreds of clicks per day, if those visits are not from your intended target demographic, you will only be seeing them spending time on your website without actually buying anything, which is really the opposite of your marketing intentions.Get a Well-Made Business WebsiteEven though, search engine optimization is necessary for businesses to compete with one another online, the importance of the website design cannot be undermined. While hiring the services of a good SEO agency can get you good marketing copy for your website and an effective use of the related keywords, having a brilliantly designed website will help a lot when it comes to attracting people and even the search engines to your website. This is true because search engines always take into account different aspects of usability and the overall layout of the business website.Cost EffectivenessThe fact of the matter remains that while using radio and TV advertisements can be an effective means of marketing a business’s product or service, it still is very expensive, especially for start-up businesses. By taking their marketing needs online and hiring the services of an experienced SEO agency, a business is able to reach thousands, or even millions of people which they would have not been able to otherwise.Using SEO Best PracticesHiring an experienced SEO agency will allow you to get information on the various techniques they have adopted in their SEO tactics. Hiring a SEO agency that has been in the game for a while will also provide you with the added advantage of not having to worry about them using any SEO techniques while working on your business website.Hiring experienced SEO experts will ensure that your website climbs the search engine ranks without using any illegal practices or short cuts that could produce short term spikes in the website’s ranking, but eventually lead to your website having to pay penalties.Access to Latest SEO TechniquesNeedless to say the field of SEO is constantly evolving, which means that it is important for businesses to stay abreast on all the latest SEO techniques that can help them stay in the game. That being said, businesses usually have little or no time to keep up with the latest developments in SEO techniques. However, an agency providing SEO services is all about being proactive in keeping up-to-date with the latest search engine news and changes in SEO techniques.Cutting-Edge ToolsKeeping in mind the last point, SEO agencies are fluent in navigating through a wide range of online marketing tools that helps increase the value of your marketing strategy. Whether it’s using web analytics for carrying out research or conversion tools that monitor and report the usage of important keywords, SEO agencies know how and where to get the information they need to save time and reduce your in-house cost.Comprehensive SEO KnowledgeAs mentioned earlier, SEO agencies are usually the most qualified in dealing with various verticals of online marketing, mainly due to the nature of their work. Therefore, an SEO agency is able to solve a multitude of problems which a business simply cannot handle by itself. An SEO agency can work together with a business to provide an added perspective, when it comes to understanding and developing marketing strategies for different sectors and various types of business websites.Bottom LineLastly, search engines like Google realize all too well that websites that don’t add value to a searcher’s experience on the internet are not worth a mention in their index. Furthermore, in some cases Google might also decide to drop your website from the SERPs altogether if you’ve used spam to get a higher page ranking.The two main goals of SEO agencies who develop marketing strategies to push your product or service online, is to make sure online content is interesting and no techniques have been used for obtaining your goals. So, are SEO agencies worth it? Absolutely!