Stan's Wonderful Widgets
Stan's got a problem. His website isn't brining in any new customers. It looks good. It's got a page listing his products and it clearly shows his telephone number. What more can he do?
He's heard online sales are booming so why isn't he getting his share of the profits?
Stan is a fly caught in the web. He needs to break free and transform himself into a spider, feeding off the internet and using it to build his business.
This series of posts will show you exactly how he does it. Step by step, in simple, understandable stages.
So what are you waiting for?
How to Turn Visitors Into Customerspublished 12 Jul 2012
Stan's website is coming on well. He's pleased with the look of the site, the online shopping works well and he's now got into the habit of writing at least one article per week. He's been using Google Analytics to monitor the website performance and he's getting more and more visitors coming each week.
But one thing is niggling him a bit.
Compared to his old website Stan is getting about 10 times more visitors. But his online sales have only just about doubled.
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Top Tips For Writing Articlespublished 27 Jun 2012
Stan's new website is all up and running. He's really pleased with the look of it and he's already starting to get more orders than with his previous website. He still needs to improve his search engine ranking and he knows he needs to add extra pages and information on a regular basis. Stan's come up with the following schedule.
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How to Get More Website Visitors - Todaypublished 17 Jun 2012
by Bob Grant
Stan has launched his new website. He knows it's going to perform much better in the search engines than his old website but also that it's going to take a few months to build up the search engine traffic (called organic traffic).
He's a bit short of work at the moment and could do with some more orders right now. He knows that if people go to the website there's a good chance they'll buy.
read more...
How to Check Your Website Works on Mobile Phonespublished 29 May 2012
by Bob Grant
When we last saw Stan he'd found the right website designer for him. Now is the time to generate ideas for what the new website will look like. Stan has heard that the mobile web is growing and is becoming more important but he's not quite sure what this means for his website. He wants to take full advantage of this mobile web but what exactly does that involve?
In simple terms the mobile web is anybody using a mobile phone or tablet computer to access Internet.
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Total Cost of Ownership of a Websitepublished 22 May 2012
by Bob Grant
No-one ever wants to talk about money do they? But in these cash-constrained times it's a subject close to everyone's heart. So let's not beat about the bush. If you want a website that will work for you, then you are going to have to part with a few pound coins at some point. But how many pound coins do you really need?
Since we last saw Stan he's narrowed down his choice of website designer using our (sort of) patented ' Website Designer Interrogation Cheat Sheet'.
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Finding 'The One'published 15 May 2012
by Bob Grant
Stan has realised that his current website isn't working for him. He's also realised that it's not going to be able to be made to work for him in the long term. So he's decided it needs an overhaul.
Stan now faces the problem of how to choose a suitable new website designer. He's made a few speculative enquiries and is confused that he's been given ball park figures which range from a couple of hundred pounds to tens of thousands of pounds.
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LET ME IN!published 6 May 2012
by Bob Grant
Having completed his website plan and his initial keyword research, Stan has decided on a plan of action.
He's broken down his list into:
NOW
NEXT FEW WEEKS
FUTURE
Under NOW he's written:
Update his prices immediately.
Insert a temporary promotional page about the brand new widget being released next month.
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The Key to Keywordspublished 28 Apr 2012
by Bob Grant
Over the past few days Stan has drawn up a detailed outline of what he wants his site to do and who his customers might be.
At this point I generally introduce the idea of keywords to my clients.
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You don't want to start from here!published 26 Apr 2012
by Bob Grant
It’s clear from our last blog post that the (badly drawn) Stan’s current website is not working properly for him.
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Introducing Stan's Wonderful Widgetspublished 15 Apr 2012
by Bob Grant
Yesterday I promised you a fictional business so meet Stan.
(Yes I KNOW it’s the worst drawing ever in the history of the internet, but give me a break, I’m not a cartoonist, I build web sites...and my son's felt tips were running dry!)
Anyway, Stan looks a bit glum and the cause of this is his current website. Stan runs a small business selling widgets. He also runs a widget repair service. About a year ago he decided he needed a website.
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