5 Good Reasons to Write a Blog

Blogging and online article writing has been around since the late 1990’s in the form of diaries, personal journals and bulletin boards. Since then it has grown in stature and has become one of the most important ways for you and your company to gain healthy online exposure and engage with potential customers.

Making sure that you play an active part in writing good quality content and useful information should now act as an essential pillar of any marketing strategy, so here are our top 5 reasons to write a blog:

1) Good for SEO
Writing, posting and sharing good quality content is an excellent way to help your website’s SEO (Search Engine Optimisation). Producing exciting material that is both relevant and engaging can be a powerful tool and search engines will reward you for it. Utilising your well-crafted content by inserting strategically placed ‘anchor text’ to link through to parts of your website or specific products can really help with you search engine rankings.

2) Gain More customers
You can use blog articles to reach out to new target audiences through avenues you had never thought possible as well as continually enthral existing customers with valuable information. Both of these benefits will ultimately draw in new or return customers and in turn generate more business. If it doesn’t achieve this immediately, don’t worry, as you will be ultimately leaving an ever increasingly large web of information that will improve your chances of realising this in the future.

3) Gives your company a voice
Even if you are not looking to gain hard sales as a result of sharing the blog articles you write, it will give you and your company a voice online. It is well worth airing your opinions and sharing useful information in the form of blog articles as users really do appreciate being provided with tips, tricks, advice, opinions, ideas and expertise. By producing regular and relevant content you it will also give you great brand exposure and kudos amongst many others that simple remain quiet.

4) Promotes Engagement
One of the most powerful elements of any Social Media channel is the ability to generate and promote engagement with total strangers. The ability to achieve this is far easier once you have built a bond through the use of quality blog articles. Great content can act as the catalyst to engagement.

5) Anyone Can do it
The beauty of article writing is that anyone can do it, yes, that’s right, anyone. You don’t need to be a professional content writer or an editor of a large magazine firm, you can simply start typing now! As long as you can type and have access to a keyboard you can start writing. Some of the best articles have been written from people that have had no past experience in content writing, but were just passionate about their subject matter. So what are you waiting for, get writing!

We at My Hosting Bubble are keen blog writers and we have seen huge benefits in continuing to release good quality, engaging articles in a subject that we are passionate in.

If you would like to know more about Social Media Marketing then please visit our site: www.myhostingbubble.com or get in touch with us.

6 Great Software Programs you’ll never see again

There has been some great software developed since the early 1990’s, many of which has paved the way for the amazing apps we see and use today. Unfortunately due to the increasingly aggressive timescales and development lifecycles of the digital marketplace many industry leaders have dropped by the wayside to make way for the dominant software players we see today.

Here are just 6 great software programs we’ll never see again, but really did carve out new and exciting niches in ways people hadn’t thought possible.

1. Netscape Navigator
Netscape Navigator dominated the web browser space throughout the mid-late 1990’s. Netscape Navigator 1.0 was launched on 15th December 1994 and the browser was the choice for millions before it lost its way during the late 1990’s, primarily due to the fact that Internet Explorer was starting to replace Netscape as people’s browser of choice.

2. Napster
Napster was an independent peer-to-peer file sharing service that focused on users being able to share music files (predominantly MP3s). It was launched in 1999 and went on to become a huge success before running into legal difficulties and ceasing to operate in the early-mid 2000’s.

3. Microsoft FrontPage
Microsoft FrontPage was one of the most successful website design and management tools of the late 1990’s. In 2006 Microsoft announced that it would be replacing FrontPage by Microsoft Expression Web and SharePoint Designer.

4. WinAmp
WinAmp was one of the most successful ‘re-skinable’ media players of the late 1990’s. The first version of Winamp was released in 1997 and quickly gained notoriety after accruing over 3 million downloads. By 2000 Winamp had over 25 million registered users.

5. Microsoft Chat
Microsoft Chat was an early graphical Internet Relay Chat (IRC) client originally released in conjunction with Internet Explorer 3.0 in 1996. Microsoft Chat set itself apart from other chat clients due to the fact that users could represent themselves as comic avatars. Microsoft Comic Chat was eventually removed from the office suite of products in line with the launch of IE 6 in 2001.

6. Lotus Symphony
Lotus Symphony was the first serious suite of office products. The package included word processing, spreadsheets, databases, charts, and a communications feature. Lotus managed to establish themselves as a great office software package from 1984 until around 1992 upon which time Microsoft had started to dominate the software space.

We would love you to get in touch with My Hosting Bubble or visit our site: www.myhostingbubble.com.
 

How important are Website Analytics?

Website analytics are often the most overlooked part of an online marketing strategy, when in actual fact they should be in place as a pre-requisite to any online presence or marketing campaign going live.

If we go back a decade, website analytics were very crude counters that just looked to simplistically keep a tally of the number of ‘hits’ on a webpage or website. The interpretation of the word ‘hit’ was always ambiguous, as most used this stats to base the success , or not, of their web presence. In actual fact most stats counters were nothing more than ‘number of page views’, so one visitor could rack up hundreds of hits on a single page screwing the figures.

We have come a long way since the day of the ‘hits’ and now some of the analytics packages available on the market, for FREE, provide the most ridiculous amount of detail. From Google Analytics and KISSMetrics through to Clicky and Crazy Egg they all have their strengths and weaknesses but are all built to interpret the data you receive from your website or online channels in different and very effective ways, then display this data to you in a way that allows you to act and improve.

So just how important is having website analytics installed? Well the answer to that question, need you ask, is VERY important.

If we were to recommend 3 important elements to you and your business that would ensure you are able to make a success of your online presence, they would be:

1) Website - A good looking Website that is designed to appeal, interest, engage & covert your audience once they land on the relevant landing page.

2) SEO - A solid SEO & optimisation strategy that looks to get your target audience to the site in numbers.

3) Analytics - The necessary Analytics in place to track, measure, report and understand what is happening in order to continually improve and improve the business you convert online.

With the 3 core elements mentioned above in place, you will have a watertight method of attracting the right sort of audience, getting traffic to your website, appealing to the visitor and then measuring and learning what is working and what isn’t in order to improve the conversion rate over time.

If you would like to talk website analytics, then please get in touch with My Hosting Bubble touch with us or visit our site: www.myhostingbubble.com.

Does offline marketing still have a place in today’s online driven society?

 

Has the huge growth of online marketing over past decade left offline marketing redundant?

Well the short answer to that is no, offline marketing should remain a pivotal part of any holistic marketing strategy.

 

Even though online marketing has become the backbone of any good marketing campaign, offline methods do still have their place in helping businesses to generate exposure and achieve their goals too.

 

Offline marketing covers areas such as:

• Exhibitions
• Networking events
• Flyers & Leaflets
• Magazines
• Radio & TV adverts or commercials
• Cold Calls
• Associations & Trade Shows
• Direct Mail 

Even though online marketing methods can sometimes achieve a much higher yield when it comes to leads an enquiries, offline methods if carried out correctly can also provide a business with huge benefits.

 

We do suggest that before you run off and start spending a fortune on your marketing campaign, you need to think carefully about exactly what it is you are trying to achieve from the marketing effort, who you are trying to reach and whether off or online channels are the most effective way to reach out to these audiences.

 

A good mixture of on and offline marketing channels is an extremely good idea, however, do bear in mind that there are differences in the cost vs the return as well as the length of time taken to see results between both of these avenues to market.

 

Offline tends to cost a little more than online methods and can take longer to see results whereas online tends to be easier to set-up and easier to run and track which also lends itself to seeing and measuring the hard benefits that it will deliver.

 

The bottom line is that both on and offline marketing channels and methods should be used in conjunction with each other to create a holistic marketing approach but more importantly the goals need to be set and measured to ensure you are fully aware of what has worked and what hasn’t.

 

If you have any queries or questions on our article then please get in touch with My Hosting Bubble or visit our site: www.myhostingbubble.com.

Getting into your Customers Heads.

When we say getting into your customers heads we mean you need to act, think, breath, sleep and be like your customers in order to understand what would appeal to them when it comes to your brand and online channels.

In order to ensure your business continues to appeal to the correct target markets, you need to fully understand your various customer personas, i.e. the types of ideal customers that would be visiting, interacting and buying from your website.

In order to achieve this you really do need to understand who your target market are and define who these groups of ideal people are.

By tackling these few simple questions you can ensure that not only does your online presence attract and convert the right audience but you will also have a much more focused business in terms of locating and targeting relevant customers.

1) Who are your ideal customers?
2) How would you describe these ideal customer personas?
3) Where do these ‘ideal customers’ hang out? On or Offline.
4) How would you go about locating these ideal customers?
5) What would entice these ideal customers to buy from you?
6) What would you need to put in place to reach out to these customers?
7) What barriers do you need to remove to appeal to these customers?
8) What would put these idea customers off buying from you?
9) What do you need these customers to do once they reach your website?
10) What is the ideal outcome for these customers?

If you look into, and answer these questions honestly by putting yourself in your ‘ideal customers’ shoes then you will have a blueprint that will help you set-up and manage a healthy flow of engagement and conversions.

My Hosting Bubble are experts in online optimisation, conversions and customer journey work so if you have any queries or questions on our article then please get in touch with us or visit our site: www.myhostingbubble.com.

How important is a Website Call to Action?

 

The online term ‘Call to Action’ (CTA) is all too often used without any real understanding of how to ensure the necessary framework is put in place to harness the power of a good CTA.

A ‘Call to Action’ helps you with several key areas on your website:

1)      They are a great visual aid to guide the visitor around the website.

2)      They are clearly visible elements of the site that gets a user to take ‘action’.

3)      They are great at bringing the user journey to a positive conclusion, e.g. a sale.

4)      They allow users to get exactly what they want, as quickly as possible.

5)      A valuable tool that allows tangible conversion and engagement tracking on websites.

There are no hard and fast rules to implementing or displaying CTA’s but there are some common sense rules to apply if you are thinking about implementing effective CTA’s within your website, they are as follows:

·         Make it Stand Out - Clearly distinguish it from other parts of the site.

·         Easy to Find - Do not bury your CTA too far down the page or make it difficult to find.

·         Make the Action Clear - What exactly do you want the user to do? Be Clear.

·         What’s the Outcome - Make it clear what’ll happen as a result of clicking the CTA.

·         Measure & Track it - Make sure you put analytics in place to track what is going on.

So actually how important are having CTA’s integrated within a website? Well the short answer is very important.

It doesn’t even need to be something as black and white as an ‘Online Sale’ it can be as simple as getting some to:

·         Read an article

·         Download a document

·         Complete a Form

·         Pick up the phone

·         Post a Comment

·         Share some Information

·         Sign-up to a Newsletter

·         Test a Product or Service

So getting your CTA’s visible on your website is only the start, but putting some real thought into their purpose and what the desired outcome of the CTA should be is an essential part of the upfront research you will need to carry out.

If you would like to understand more about how to use and generate business via Twitter them please get in touch with us or visit our website: www.myhostingbubble.com.

How to use Twitter to generate Business.

Twitter is synonymous with social interaction and engaging audiences you may never have been able to reach out to otherwise, however it is also a very powerful business tool that should be seen as an integral part of any business marketing strategy.

Used in the right way Twitter can not only engage potential clients but also spur them into an action of your choosing.

What needs to be understood when it comes to using Twitter for business is that it is not, and has never been designed with the intent of being used as a hard-sell tool. It is all about bonding and communicating with people on their level, it’s about building relationships on a P2P level (Person to Person) as opposed to a B2B (Business to Business) or B2C (Business to Consumer). Twitter should be a tool handled with care, but in the right hands can be an effective business tool.

Here are just some of the ways in which Twitter can be used to generate business without the hard sell.

1) Don’t under Estimate the Hashtag
Hashtags when used correctly can be a very powerful tool to reach out to new, or desired audiences. The use of relevant and purposeful hashtags can fast-track your posts being noticed and increase the possibility of it being shared with the most relevant audience. You don’t need to go mad with the hashtags, but a few select, relevant ones will go a long way to engaging many more potential clients.

2) Go Fishing
When we say go fishing we mean you can sit there and wait for people to respond to your posts and tweets or you can go and actively look for business and people to engage with. For example if you are selling shoes, maybe you could do a search on anyone that has written or hashtagged for ‘I need a new pair of shoes’ or ‘Mens Shoes’ or ‘new shoes’. This way you can pro-actively enter into discussions, threads and posts relevant to your business or product.

3) There is a time & place for Sales
As mentioned above, Twitter is not meant to be used as a hard-sell tool and users will get frustrated and turned off by any attempt to aggressively of frequently sell to them. Yes if you are running a business to do need to promote your products, but this should be done in a phased and friendly way. Building the bond is far more important than promoting your sales pitch.

4) Be Different
There is a hell of a lot of content, imagery, videos and general ‘noise’ out there on the internet and this is growing at a rapid rate. So it is worth really thinking about what makes you different from others and in what way you would lure potential customers in. It’s worth asking yourself at the outset, what makes you stand out from the crowd?

5) Engage, Engage !!
If you want to get your business name and brand out there, it’s far better to be pro-active and engage with people and posts as opposed to reactive or just plain invisible. By engaging in the correct manor online to others tweets, comments and opinions you can really start to make a name for yourself. In fact that’s all some people are brought in to do, comment, re-post and generally ‘get amongst’ other communities and conversations.

If you would like to understand more about how to use and generate business via Twitter them please get in touch with us or visit our website: www.myhostingbubble.com.