A blog from The Design Loft geeks about SEO, web design, traditional marketing, some iPhone stuff and general geeky ramblings.
Archive for January, 2010
Setting Up Your Website For SEO Success
Jan 27th
I’m a huge believer in getting to know my client’s processes, business goals and background. I think it gives me more scope to deliver a higher quality, and more effective website.
And when I say more effective I mean all round; search engine wise, lead generation wise, usability wise and so on.
When I build a website I consider various things before I’ve even started to build it, all encompassed in the broad headings I’ve given above.
But what about the build? How best to tackle that? I’m sure that every designer or developer has their own traits and techniques that make them More >
£99 Google Adwords Reseller Scam – Are Your Clients Affected?
Jan 26th
I’ve heard from a few clients recently about them receiving marketing or telephone calls from “Official Google Adwords Resellers”.
And it’s not just me, a few marketing buddies have also heard this.
So, what’s it all about?
A “reseller” calls up your client and offers them a guaranteed listing on page 1 of sponsored listings, with unlimited clicks through to their site, all for a small fee of £99.00 per month.
The biggest culprits of this so far seem to be Matchmaker Marketing.
I’ve long been dubious about this. As a SEM it’s hard not to be, and anyone who has conducted even a simple More >
Should You Tweak Your SEO Now That Google Personalises Search Results With Web History?
Jan 22nd
There’s been a lot of hype recently about Google’s Web History functionality. If you’re not sure what that is, I’ll try an explain:
As a “guest user” of Google (i.e. you’re not signed in with your Google Account credentials), all of the web searches you perform are logged, and stored for a period of 180 days. The click throughs that you make based on these searches to any given website will then affect how that website is placed in your personal SERP (search engine results page) for any related searches. Following the 180 days, old entries are displaced by newer searches More >
Small And Perfectly Formed – Look Out For The Little Guy And You May Be In Luck
Jan 21st
I’ve just been directed to a fantastic little article by a great designer friend of mine.
Oddly, it kind of links into what I was blogging about yesterday; increasing customer services skills as a web designer.
The article briefly talks about how freelance designers can easily segregate their clients into the “big clients” and the “small clients”, and how sometimes that might not be the best way to think.
Its very easy to flag or leave until later the small requests from your smaller or more sporadic clients. Those little requests for small or low money jobs can sometimes get “lost” as they More >
Easily Boost Your Customer Service Skills As A Web Designer
Jan 20th
As a web designer, and especially a freelance web designer, it’s sometimes hard to choose the projects that really get you going.
We all love projects where we’re actually engaged by the subject matter; we recently did one for ADL Tattoo Removal Lasers and the subject matter really intrigued and interested me – it was a great site to be involved in.
Of course, as a designer you have to give the same level of customer service and engagement to all clients, regardless of the sector or industry that they’re in. It helps make us better designers, helps our business grow and equally More >
Designing In The Browser – A New Way For Web Designers?
Jan 18th
Howdy
Is designing in the browser the new prototyping method of choice for customer focused web designers? Well, I’ve been reading up quite a bit on designing in the browser recently; “live prototyping” if you will.
There are plenty of arguments for and against this, and in all honestly I’ll likely still mock up my designs in Photoshop, test drive them with the client and then slice and dice ready for some nice HTML on the desktop.
However, the pros and cons of designing in the browser are well worth a read, there’s a great post on “Making Your Mock-Up In Mark-Up” over More >
5 Essential iPhone Apps for Web Professionals
Jan 14th
Hi all
After writing about some essential Mac dashboard widgets for web designers and developers I thought it’d be useful to elaborate on what I use on my iPhone to aid my daily work.
Before I start, these aren’t apps that necessarily aid design; whilst there are plenty of those out there (CSS & jQuery cheat sheets and so on), I’ve always found that I never used them; if I ever I need something like this, I’m in front of my desk working away on a desktop Mac or PC anyway.
What I (and many others) tend More >
